


Hungry Ghosts

by ifinkufreaky



Category: Vikings (TV)
Genre: Adventure, Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Aslaug Lives AU, Cannibalism, F/M, Horror, Mystery, Slow Burn, evil spirits, monster story, shamanic magic
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-03-06
Updated: 2018-12-03
Packaged: 2019-03-27 15:39:52
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 36,738
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13883913
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ifinkufreaky/pseuds/ifinkufreaky
Summary: Licking his wounds back in Kattegat after leaving Ivar and the Great Army, Ubbe's curiosity is piqued by a young woman traveling alone with her child. Mikala, of the coastal people living far to the north, has come seeking a queen with a reputation for visions, to ask about evil spirits and cures for curses.





	1. what you seek

**Author's Note:**

> For this piece I have scooped up Kattegat and some of my favorite characters and dropped them into my own fantasy setting. Neighboring lands and Mikala's culture are NOT intended to represent any real-world countries or ethnicities. I am in the middle of some heavy research on the lifeways of various Arctic and sub-Arctic cultures for this setting, and my intent is to create a respectful and interesting fantasy version of such a people. Comments and questions are welcome.

It was the first time the snow had cleared long enough for Ubbe to make it to the great hall at Kattegat since winter began. Not that it was much better than being in the cabin alone with Mother; he was really just trading one oppressive experience for another. Still, there were supplies that they needed, as well as appearances to keep up. Lagertha had to be reminded that she was not so easily rid of the many sons of Ragnar Lothbrok. And so he trudged along.

Since he had lost control of the Great Army and returned home to Kattegat in the autumn, Ubbe had not found a place where he felt settled. Lagertha had offered him an alliance against Ivar, but he kept putting her off. He was not yet certain that his relationship with his terrifying younger brother could not be salvaged, given a little distance. Some time for the boy to mature. Nor was he sure that he didn’t want to fight Lagertha for control of Kattegat, himself.

Aslaug certainly wanted that of him; she never outright said it, especially given her promise that she would not set her sons against her usurper, but Ubbe could feel her wishes breathing heavy against his back all the time, now that they were alone together in her exile. And when he went up to the hall, the same wish lay suspended behind the pale eyes of the thrall Margrethe, who lifted her skirts for him whenever he asked and then rambled on about her fantasies of being his Queen. One day. When he was ready to make his move. He had almost married her once, but Mother talked him out of it. She was saving his marriage bed for political advantage. One day.

There was a time when Ubbe had assumed he would rule Kattegat. Bjorn had always been so restless, in and out of their lives with the seasons. And it was not Bjorn’s mother who sat beside Ragnar’s throne, those days. Ubbe’s destiny had seemed clear.

Now, doubt obscured everything. Ubbe was not like Ivar, that much had been made painfully clear in England. He may be the elder brother, have the better claim, but he was no longer certain he had the instincts, or the stomach, for what it would take to wrest power away from those who already had it. The cost in blood, and suffering of the innocent, did not rest easy upon his conscience. Lagertha had been ruling Kattegat well. Perhaps it was better for their people if Ubbe just let her keep that seat.

But then what was left for him?

“If only I could know my destiny, Mother,” Ubbe had asked a few days ago, staring out into the height of the swirling midwinter storm. “You made prophecies for Sigurd and Ivar, but none for me.” Ubbe immediately regretted mentioning those two names in the same sentence.

“And look how much those prophecies turned out to be worth.” Aslaug no longer spoke as fondly of Ivar as she once had, now that Ubbe had dared to tell her the truth of what happened in Wessex. “Close the door.” She no longer spoke very much at all.

Ubbe held the frame a moment longer, though his fingertips were already beginning to freeze. The air was so oppressive in the cabin. Ubbe had never felt he had much in common with his mother, but lately they were a perfect match in their fruitless brooding.

She startled him when she spoke again, shortly after he sealed the passage against the wind. “I did see something. Just before you were born.” Her words came slowly, and when he turned she was not looking at him. Aslaug’s attention was ever like the sun on cloudy days; longed-for, brilliant, and fleeting. For every one of her sons but Ivar. “I never spoke of it because I did not know what it meant.”

Ubbe remained still, on his feet, waiting for her to finish.

“A great black wolf, shaggy and howling.” Finally her piercing eyes lifted to his. “Waiting for you.”

Ubbe struggled to suppress a shudder. A vision more than twenty years gone and still it made her eyes look like that. “Fenrir?”

“No. It was not a creature known to our people. Of that I was certain.” She heaved a sigh, made her excuse. “Your father and I were just getting used to each other. I chose not to unsettle him, describing such a vision regarding our first, unborn son.”

Ubbe felt a bit unsettled himself. It was waiting for him?

“But I named you for it all the same. Surely, I thought, there was some great power in it.”

Great power. Ubbe was so tired of power. He shook his head. “But I am not the wolf.”

“No,” Aslaug said, a soft apology in her voice. “The wolf is only your destiny.”

“That doesn’t mean anything to me.”

Aslaug’s smile was mirthless, enigmatic. She was already turning away from him. “Maybe it never meant anything. Did the dragon Fafnir turn out to do Sigurd any good?”

“You will have to ask Ivar,” Ubbe growled. Aslaug scowled and turned her body squarely away, returned to her cooking. They were both so angry, but in such different ways that they could not comfort each other in either grief or ire.

And then they barely spoke for the next few days. Ubbe found himself happy to step into the great hall at Kattegat, even if most everything he laid eyes on was tainted with bitterness, nostalgia for a home and family turned hollow. At least there were more distractions up here. He was not the only one taking advantage of the break in the weather to come into town, and the longhouse was bustling.

Lagertha sat upon the tall wooden throne she had built after she replaced Aslaug, taking petitioners. She gave an expressionless nod to Ubbe when he settled into a seat near her end of the hall to listen.

Most of the assembled people were local farmers, seeking assistance or justice in disputes that had been brewing over the winter. Lagertha handled these with a shrewd wisdom that Ubbe could find no fault with. She was not a bad ruler. But, he hadn’t thought his mother had been, either.

One woman among the assembled stood out; her clothes marked her as an outsider, from the people who lived far to the north and east. She was dressed in thick layers of fur and hides that covered her from feet to chin, though in the warmth of the hall she had her coat open and her hood thrown back. Her hair was glossy black and thick, plaited neatly to frame a face he thought to be not much older than his own. Her deep brown eyes were fixed on Lagertha, and she bounced rhythmically on her heels as she waited her turn, making no move to speak with anyone else.

The people of her land sometimes came down this far to trade, but she did not look like a trader. The sound of a baby fussing rose above the murmuring chatter of the hall, and the woman twisted her head over her shoulder. When she turned like that, Ubbe could see that she had a child strapped to her back, one who had clearly just woken up unhappily. The woman reached back to stroke its face, her lips forming a soft ‘o’ as she cooed in an attempt to soothe the child, without much success. She danced and bounced in place, but she was clearly loathe to leave her spot in the loose line of those waiting to address the queen.

A middle-aged woman standing nearby smiled warmly at the pair, but the Northern girl did not seem to notice her silent offer of help. Instead, the young mother loosened the babe from its seat on her back and drew him around to disappear inside the front of her coat. From the way her eyes went dreamy and unfocused a moment later, Ubbe could only assume she was nursing the child.

He let his thoughts drift again. He was not here with any real purpose, other than to make Lagertha watch him eat her food and sip her ale. Just to make her ass feel a little bit itchy on that throne. Later, he would load sacks from her food stores, buy a few things in the market on her credit, and go back to caring for his despondent mother who had nowhere else to go. Back to endless thoughts of justice, and birthrights, of jealousy and suffering and pain. Would Ivar ever return here, and contest Lagertha? If Ubbe gained the throne first, would Ivar join him at his side or across the field? Either way, would he and Hvitserk ever feast together again?

The woman clad in furs caught Ubbe’s eye again when she reached her turn and stepped out into the space before the high seat of Kattegat. “You look like you have traveled a long way,” Lagertha said warmly as the girl rocked back squarely on her heels and looked up at her. “Tell me your name.”

“Mikala,” the girl said. Her voice was rich and soft. She flicked her head down in quick obeisance a moment too late, like she was just remembering that it seemed to be the right thing.

Lagertha smiled at the belated gesture. Ubbe knew she liked the feeling of power, but also remembered being a peasant herself. “From where have you come?”

Mikala flung one arm vaguely in an inland direction. “Very far. I have traveled through many lands, many peoples, to get here.”

“To find me?” Lagertha asked with a small smile, settling back in the wooden chair.

Mikala tried the hunching bow again, dipping her head a little more gracefully this time. “I have heard that this land is ruled by a very wise woman. One great in magic, who sees things no one else can see.”

Lagertha drew herself up again, frowning. Her eyes flicked halfway to Ubbe before she could stop them. “The woman you are describing was not fit to rule here. She deposed me through her trickery once, and now she is gone.” Ubbe grunted and let his heavy spoon clatter onto the plate, but Lagertha would not be interrupted. “She is no wise woman, and her prophecies are false. She is not worth your time.” He slammed his ale cup down next, but still she would not turn.

Mikala glanced at him though, her attention caught by the noise. Ubbe raised his brows as he decided what he might call out to her, but Lagertha was speaking again before any words came from his mouth.

“I am sorry to be the one to tell you, that the object of your search ends in such disappointment. But tell me more about the wisdom that you seek, and perhaps I can still be of aid to you. I do not practice forbidden witchcraft, but I know many things.”

Mikala’s child chose that moment to begin fussing again, and she made several sharp shushing noises and gave him a few more vigorous bounces before responding. “I seek knowledge. About … a matter of the spirits.” The child wailed; Mikala began patting him rhythmically but his volume only decreased a little. “One that might be known to your people.” At least, Ubbe thought that was what she said. It was hard to make out between the child’s cries.

Lagertha looked down on the mother and babe indulgently. “Let us speak more later. Go tend to your child. You must be weary, having traveled so far, and in such a winter as this one. You are welcome to stay as my guest here, and spend the rest of the season in our longhouse. Continue your travels when it is less dangerous. I will come speak with you more privately later on.”

Mikala’s head ducked in thanks and Lagertha dismissed her with a wave of her hand, already looking for the next petitioner. The Northern girl rushed to a back corner of the hall, where she tried to settle her child down without interrupting the rest of the goings-on.

Ubbe waited a few minutes before following. Lagertha had to have known he was going to do it, but his pride dictated that he not be seen rushing off immediately to speak with the woman who had clearly come here seeking _his_ mother. Lagertha had been playing politics in her response, and Ubbe could be mindful of appearances in his own actions, too.

When he reached the raven-haired woman, she was sitting on the edge of an unoccupied bench and watching her small child toddle around the edges of it. Rather than ignoring the adorable babe, Ubbe crouched down a pace away and waved with a bright smile. Only then did he lift his eyes to meet Mikala’s. “Your child’s legs are as strong as his lungs,” he commented wryly.

Mikala ducked her head with a blushing grin, that reflexive expression of embarrassment that all peoples share. “I am sorry if he disturbed you.”

“It is good,” Ubbe said, shaking his head to dismiss her concern as he rose back to his full height and stepped closer to her. “He will grow into a strong man, not afraid to ask for what he wants.”

_And what do you want, Ubbe?_ He dismissed the thought as soon as it rose, twisting his neck slightly.

“Oh, Djalo is never afraid of that,” Mikala replied softly, staring fondly at her son as he attempted to climb up on the bench.

“Strong arms, too,” Ubbe added as they watched the boy succeed in his scrambling task.

Mikala slid down the bench toward her child, gathering him closer to her with one hand. Then she looked up at Ubbe with guarded eyes. After a moment of thought, she welcomed him to take the seat on the other side of her with a flick of her arm. “You did not like what the queen had to say about the woman I came here seeking.”

Ubbe flashed her the charming, lopsided grin he had learned from his father as he settled down beside her. She must be so afraid, to be alone among strangers not of her people. “Yes. Lagertha did not tell you the whole truth.”

She pressed her lips together and only waited for him to continue. Her son was standing beside her upon the bench now, his small fingers playing with the beads embellishing her collar.

“The wise woman who used to rule here, she is my mother,” he explained, and he saw Mikala’s eyes shift into true interest. “Lagertha took the throne from her, but she did not kill her. She lives with me, half a day’s walk outside the town.”

Mikala was distracted by her son’s tugging fingers, which had moved on from her coat to her hair. “Shh, Djalo,” she reprimanded, casting about for something else to distract him with.

“Here,” Ubbe said, drawing a wooden comb from his pocket and waving it slowly in front of the child’s face. It was inlaid with a carving of a horse, shiny bits of shell set in for the eye and hooves. “Do you want to look at this?” he asked in a light, sing-song voice. “Such a pretty horsey, isn’t it?”

As he had hoped, the child was fascinated, grasping tiny fingers around either end and bringing the blue-white shell bits close to his eyes. His fat baby face creased into a smile, and then the end of the comb disappeared into his mouth.

Mikala clucked her tongue and moved to take Djalo’s new treasure away just as Ubbe shook his open palm reassuringly. “It’s alright, he can do it.”

“He is teething,” Mikala explained, trying again to rescue the comb.

“I don’t mind a few dents in it,” Ubbe said. When his brothers were young he had hated babies, but now that they were all grown he found that he loved indulging small children. Their happiness was so simple, and helped him feel such a thing might be possible again for him one day too.

Mikala flashed Ubbe a grateful look, then pulled the boy down to sit in her lap, sucking on his treasure contentedly. “Do you think that your mother would speak with me?” Her eyes were wide and weary and patient. Whatever she was looking for, Ubbe got the sense that this was not the beginning of her journey. And that she did not expect to be anywhere close to its end.

“Of course,” he said. The very question was surprising. “I can bring you there tomorrow. I am sure she would be happy to meet you.”

 

Ubbe spent the rest of the afternoon attending to his business and visiting with old friends, but the mysterious woman never quite left his thoughts. He found he was burning with curiosity about the matter she had to discuss with his mother. Surely it had to do with Aslaug’s reputation for visions. What could propel a young mother so far from her home, and in such a terrible season?

Given the early dark of winter, Ubbe preferred to spend the night in the guest hall, and wait to travel back to the cabin only once the sun began to peek its fleeting rays above the horizon. He was not certain he believed the tales of roaming _draugr_ and wild hunts taking place in the frigid darkness, but one would be a fool to risk it.

He could have sought out Margrethe’s company; it had been several moons since he had last seen her and surely she would be kind to him. But he thought of his suspicion that she was wishing Hvitserk were the one who had returned to Kattegat, and found himself remaining squarely in his seat by the central hearth tonight.

His eyes strayed to Mikala often as he took the evening meal in the amber light of the great hall. She was in the company of a few more of her people now; perhaps she was part of a trading expedition after all. She spoke very little to her companions, however, as they enjoyed Lagertha’s feast. As ever, her attention was squarely upon her child. The boy’s antics managed to flash the most becoming smile across her round face more than once, and each time Ubbe felt privileged for the glimpse of such free and simple love. Her enigmatic eyes locked with Ubbe’s a few times, but he did not approach her again. One of those men was likely her husband. He would escort her to Aslaug tomorrow, she would ask her questions, and then the mystery would be over.

 

* * *

 

Mikala found him when Ubbe had barely roused himself the next morning, before the thin winter sun had even begun to turn the sky from black to purple. She was loaded with her personal effects, including what looked like a bowcase, and Djalo was in his seat on her back. The boy gave Ubbe a wide smile, proudly displaying the edge of a single tooth as he peeked out past the fur trimming his mother’s hood.

Ubbe rubbed one hand over his face, still stiff from sleep, and grinned back at the child. He did not miss the way Mikala’s impassive face softened just a fraction at the interaction taking place over her shoulder.

They walked a path now hard-packed in the snow by other travelers taking advantage of the break in the weather, and so their trek was relatively easy as the cresting sun turned everything indigo, then rosy pink and gold. Ubbe amused himself pulling more faces at Djalo for a while, but the boy was quickly lulled to sleep by the swaying of his mother’s body.

Mikala turned out to not be one for much conversation. Her one-word answers to Ubbe’s queries left him feeling like he was prying, but he was too curious about her to stay silent. “I am surprised none of those men I saw you with have joined us today,” he found himself saying. “Is that your family you travel with?”

Mikala shook her head. “I have no family left,” she said.

Ubbe grunted softly. “I am sorry.” What would it be like, not to be surrounded by kin, the weight of their expectations and disappointments? “None of those men is your husband?”

“No. I barely know them.” Mikala continued to look straight ahead as she spoke, and Ubbe chose to stay quiet, leaving space for this mysterious woman to string more than a few words together at a time. “They are brothers,” she finally elaborated. Ubbe only made a noise in the back of his throat, indicating his interest. “When I learned I needed to come here, I found these men planning to make the journey already. Their sledges are loaded with skins and furs and they will winter here, until they are all sold. Then they will go back to my people carrying iron and fine cloth, just before the spring thaw.”

“Do you not have those things, where you are from?”

“We do not have the ways of making them.” She shrugged; the baby made a cooing sound but settled himself without waking. “We do not even need them, but they can be nice to have. A metal knife keeps a sharper edge than a stone one.” Her eyes flicked to the sword hanging at his hip, some unreadable thought sliding through them.

Ubbe grunted again. “You said someone told you that you needed to come here?”

Her wide-set eyes narrowed, and he thought he had just lost the little ground he had gained with her. “Yes.” She set her gaze far off toward the horizon, near where the sun’s pale disc had finally cleared the edge of the earth. “Your mother may have something that I need.”

 

Aslaug did not come to the door when Ubbe called out as they approached the lonely cabin. “Mother. We have guests.” Her hair was still mussed from sleep when they trudged in relief into the shelter, though the day was already half gone. “This is Mikala, and her son Djalo.”

Aslaug barely stirred from her chair near the hearth. She clutched her shawl around her body and Ubbe suspected she had been crying. This was not the reception he had expected, though he wondered instantly why he had thought this would go any better. His mother’s lidded eyes swept across Mikala’s clothing of animal skins, the foreign styling of her hair. Her tight-lipped smile was polite, but she raised her brow at Ubbe as soon as the girl’s back was turned, shedding her heavy parka in the warmth of their home.

Ubbe was reminded of when he was small, and had tried to take in a mangy, rain-soaked dog he had found in the market. Mikala’s little boy did nothing to help the impression, fussing loud and insistently to be let down from his mother’s back and be allowed to explore the new space. Mikala was torn between calming her son and putting her best foot forward with Aslaug.

“Let me,” Ubbe murmured, stepping toward the pair with open hands. Mikala hesitated a moment before flashing him a grateful nod and turning to let him take the boy from her back. “Let me show you around my house, Djalo,” he said cheerfully, pulling the child from his cloth-wrapped seat with a wide smile. Thankfully, Djalo seemed delighted to be plucked up in his unfamiliar hands. A brave boy, too.

When Ubbe glanced back at Aslaug, she was staring at him with a bemused smile, head cocked at the same angle as Ivar’s when he saw weakness. He shook off the chill of the comparison and brought Djalo to examine the dried herbs hanging near the window.

“Well met, Aslaug, daughter of Sigurd,” he heard Mikala’s soft voice say. His mother made only a small noise in reply. She was not in the mood for visitors, that much was plain. “Thank you for welcoming me into your home.”

“And what brings a woman of the far North to my door?” Aslaug asked, voice ringing like a bell. Ubbe worried suddenly that she might not be welcoming their guest at all. The abrupt question was just a little short of plain rudeness. He turned his body so Djalo’s little hands could reach the hanging greenery but he could also keep an eye on the women’s faces.

Mikala took Aslaug’s attitude in stride. “I have heard tales of a wise woman in this village.” She ducked her head the way she had done for Lagertha. “One who sees many things that are hidden.”

Ubbe had expected his mother to preen under the flattery, but she looked only weary. “There are none here fitting that description, save for me,” she acknowledged, “but still I must tell you that you have wasted your time.” Ubbe felt his forehead crease, bounced the child on his hip a little faster.

Mikala did not see what he could already read in his mother’s tragic face. The girl stepped forward, instead. “I am in search of things that are not known to my own people,” she continued on, making her case. “I have a hope that one with your reputation for Sight will be able to find them for me.”

“Your hope is misplaced,” the old queen declared, mouth twisting on the very word ‘hope.’ She stood abruptly, surprising Mikala with her height. Even at her most despondent, Aslaug moved with a commanding grace that controlled the room. “There was a time when I thought the gods were granting me true visions,” she deigned to explain. “Now everything is in ashes. I will not be able to help you.” She strode across the room, to the sacks Ubbe had dropped by the doorway. “Is this our flour, Ubbe? What else were you able to get for us from the market?"

Ubbe looked from his mother’s back, bent over the bag of supplies, to Mikala’s impassive face. He was ready to soothe her disappointment, but he did not see any in the girl’s countenance. Her mouth even twisted in a faint smile as she looked to her son on his hip. She reached out to take the boy back from Ubbe, and kept her thoughts to herself.

Ubbe stepped past her and sighed loudly. “She came a long way to see you, Mother.”

“Lagertha is letting the thralls get lazy.” Aslaug had the sack open, running the grainy flour through her fingers. “They’re shirking their time at the mill. We will be eating coarse bread this month.”

 

Mother had used up most of the stack of firewood that Ubbe had piled inside for her before he made the trek into town. When he went outside to fetch some more, Mikala followed. “I am sorry for Mother’s rudeness,” he said softly, so his voice would not carry back in through the wall. “I knew she was bitter, but…” _but I did not think she had lost this much faith_.

Mikala waved her hand curtly, dismissing his apology. “it is the way of all shamans, to test my resolve. I am never surprised by it any more.”

Was she truly not offended? Ubbe settled back on his heels, eyes wandering her face as he absorbed her words. ‘Shaman’ must mean the wise ones of her people. “It has never been _her_ way, to be like this when someone comes to her for help.”

Mikala pressed her lips together and lifted her shoulders in a soft shrug. “Perhaps she is just lonely, in her exile.” Ubbe had explained the bare bones of how they came to live here on their journey down. “I will stay here awhile and provide her with company.”

“I, at least, would welcome that.” But underneath the earnest words that bubbled out of him, Ubbe was uncertain; what kind of intrusion had he brought into their lives of silent waiting? He had not realized how much ice had grown over their hearts until Mikala’s soft feet had tried to step across.


	2. patience

She did not ask Aslaug a question for half a moon. The first night, she helped with the cooking, and when Ubbe woke up the next day Mikala had already set herself to sweeping the floor. Her boy was up on her back again, cooing at the way her back-and-forth movements made him dance in his seat. When Aslaug set to mending, Mikala produced her own needles and picked up a stocking beside her. She made light conversation; remarking on differences in their stitching techniques, telling small stories of her son or of life in her own village. Teasing out some of Aslaug’s stories as well. And never once uttering a single question. Ubbe was burning with curiosity about Mikala’s history and purpose here, but he decided each day to respect her stratagem and avoid the topic until she, or his mother, decided the time was right.

She was still soft-spoken, and silence filled the cabin as often as words, but Mikala was not quite the taciturn woman that had walked beside Ubbe down from Kattegat. He learned over the following weeks that she had grown up with two older brothers, that her favorite food was salmon, and that he and Djalo had spoken the same first word: “doggie.” Ubbe marveled at the way she seemed to be clearing the frost from his mother’s face as they made soft conversation about such simple sources of joy. While Mikala often looked sad, and was surely thinking of her own troubles at those times, she refrained each day from speaking of them. She kept the focus in the cabin on the mundane concerns of life, and had a way of making such small things sound like the most sacred and meaningful aspects of life. Ubbe was captivated; happy to let her take his mind away from his own brooding preoccupations, and she seemed to be having a similar effect on Aslaug.

Djalo’s presence helped too. Aslaug, a woman who had decided long ago to make her life all about her children, couldn’t help but let this boy’s chubby cheeks and awkward, stamping gait lighten the loads across her brow. Whenever he was awake, he was the center of attention for all of them. Aslaug began to sing songs that hadn’t graced Ubbe’s ears in years. She bounced the boy on her knee and told stories Ubbe had never heard about himself and his brothers as babes.

Apparently Sigurd had never quite learned to crawl, but rather cried to be carried everywhere until he started pulling himself up onto his feet and then skipped straight to walking. And when Hvitserk was born, Ubbe hated so much to not be the only child anymore that he was once caught pulling his baby brother in his toy cart up toward the gods’ grove to “give him back.” Mikala laughed at that one until tears streamed down her cheeks, her fit of mirth renewing every time she looked at Ubbe’s flushed and embarrassed face.

He started to believe Mikala’s plan really might be providing a balm his mother’s heart. He knew she missed the company of life at the big hall. And that she missed the services of the thralls, too. She hated many of the tedious chores and had neglected more than one here in her exile. Not that Mikala acted like a thrall. There was nothing servile about the way she picked up the forgotten tasks of the household, took the former queen’s soft direction. She just… did what needed doing. In a way that made the days feel lighter and easier to all of them. She more than earned her keep as the moon waxed and waned over the little cabin.

Mikala’s influence did not extend to making Ubbe’s days any freer of labor, however; she got him working too. Made just a few observations about his customs and habits that called him lazy without ever uttering any words to the effect at all. But soon he found himself in the rafters, stopping up a leak that they could hear but had never bothered to look for, while Mikala mended a tear in the fur that trimmed his winter cloak. She accompanied him out to gather wood for the hearth, and a few soft words about the game trails they saw in the snow led him to spending the whole afternoon making snares to set out the next morning.

She was good for them. He thought he and his mother had been living almost as ghosts before Mikala came; haunted by the turmoil of their past and unable to conceive of a life in the future. Ubbe felt as if he could suddenly breathe easier, and he wondered exactly how long it had been since he had known air this fresh. Would have felt this way if Mother had allowed him to marry Margrethe last year? And he was more certain than ever that his father’s dream was true: finding land to farm in peace, to raise livestock and a little family, was a more noble goal than any gold or glory. ~~~~

 

He felt clumsy; oafish, even. While Ubbe trudged with labored steps through the fresh snow covering the track leading to the river, Mikala moved with the grace of a seal ahead of him, all but swimming through the white fluff that had fallen last night. It was almost odd to see her unencumbered, without her child on her back, but she had left Djalo with Aslaug so that they could carry more water back up to the cabin. They could have made do melting snow in buckets, but Aslaug said the riverwater carried some special properties. It was possible she just thought it tasted better, but either way the two of them found themselves willing to oblige her on this clear and windless morning.

Halfway down to the riverbank, Ubbe’s toe caught something under the blanket of snow. He stumbled, cursed, then steadied the wooden yoke holding the larger empty buckets braced over his shoulders. Mikala held two more buckets in her hands ahead of him; she swung them wide and careless as she turned her upper body back to face him, peering past her hood with one raised eyebrow at his outburst. “It’s nothing,” Ubbe grunted. His face heated when a playful smile curved her lips; he felt shamed and flattered both to have caught her attention with his blunder.

He had found himself wishing for her attention more and more these days. The young mother was so mysterious, her heavy gaze so often drifting to the side like she was thinking ten times more thoughts than she would ever speak. He wanted to know what they were. Perhaps now that they were out of Aslaug’s hearing, Mikala might be more frank with him. He cleared his throat. “Is there anything I can do to help,” he tried, “with your search?”

Mikala swiveled again, still making her way down the gently sloping hill. “What would you do? What do you know of the spirit world?” She had answered his question with a question, giving up nothing new, but at least she wasn’t gruff about it. She pursed her lips almost playfully, like she had just issued a challenge.

“I have heard plenty of things, regarding magic and gods,” Ubbe boasted, replying with a wide smile. He thought of the many nights when Floki had visited the longhouse, speaking grand and wild stories in his strange, soft voice. He remembered the tales his mother spun of their ancestors. “My own grandfather slayed the fearsome Fafnir, you know. Who had been cursed into the form of a terrible dragon.”

Mikala stumbled in front of him. He almost caught up to her before she steadied herself and stepped onward. “He was cursed?” Her tone seemed softer.

“By a magical ring,” Ubbe said. He watched the ground more carefully with each step, trying not to be distracted by the conversation. If Mikala was having trouble with the terrain here, he most certainly would. “Many heroes and gods fought to possess it. My grandfather Sigurd defeated him, and won the ring. Then he drank the dragon’s blood and ate his heart, and gained many powers from it: prophecy, wisdom, and great strength.”

Something had shifted in the way Mikala held herself as she walked on before him, but Ubbe could not decide quite what it was. “And what then happened to this great Sigurd?” she asked without turning. “Was he cursed too?”

Ubbe moved closer to her shoulder. He wasn’t learning any more about her in this line of conversation, but he had to admit it felt good to be holding her interest.

“He did not become a dragon, if that is what you mean. They say he became invulnerable by bathing in the dragon’s blood. He could not be hurt anywhere save for one spot on his back, where a leaf had clung to his skin.” He couldn’t resist reaching over and pressing his hand against her flank, demonstrating the location. The gesture felt surprisingly intimate even through her thick coat and his own mittens. He cleared his throat and continued. “He may have been cursed to tragedy, though. He did not live to be an old man. He was betrayed by people close to him, who knew about that weakness. They killed him only shortly after my mother was born.”

Mikala grunted in small sympathy. “And what happened to the ring?”

“It is said they threw all Sigurd’s treasure into the river, so that his widow would have no resources with which to avenge him.”

“And so the curse has not fallen to anyone else.”

Ubbe twisted his neck wryly. “I suppose it falls now on whatever sorry soul fishes that ring out of the water.” Though a part of him wondered, just a little, if its influence hadn’t continued down the generations, infecting his mother’s luck, and that of her sons.

Mikala started to turn toward him again, her eyes wide and guarded like she was about to ask a more difficult question. But before she could speak her foot slid out from under her; she must have hit a patch of hidden ice. Her surprised face came barreling toward his, buckets flying as her arms rushed up to stop herself from crashing head-first into him. Ubbe caught her around the waist, but her momentum twisted both their bodies and he could feel her throwing off his balance too far as she clung to him in her surprise.

Their bodies thudded into a thick snowbank. Ubbe tried to keep his weight off of her as they impacted, but though his hip fell to the side his chest ended up squarely on top of hers. Mikala’s breath hit his face when they landed, the air squeezing out of her all at once with a soft, vaguely-distressed noise. He found his eyes fixated on her berry-red, parted lips as she gulped in a fresh breath.

Dislodged snowflakes glittered in the air all around her head. She looked bemused as she stared up at him, and Ubbe’s next steaming breath mingled with hers in the tiny space between their faces. It suddenly occurred to him how pleasant it would feel to kiss her, this small woman who had dominated his days and his thoughts for weeks now.

Her body shifted under his, in what he imagined to be discomfort, and the moment passed. “Sorry,” he huffed, rolling his upper body off of hers. “Are you alright?”

“No, I am sorry,” she said at the same time. “I knocked you right over.”

Ubbe sat up in the snow, looking for where his wooden yoke with the large buckets had spun away. The back of his arm was a little sore from where it must have banged him on the way down, and he rubbed at it absently. “There is no harm done.”

He risked looking back at her face, flushed and still panting a little. When she sat up her hood had fallen back, and snowy crystals clung to her gleaming hair. A few black strands had come loose from their plaits, falling across her brow in a way that he found quite becoming.

She had that nervous smile again. Ubbe tried to understand. He himself had never ventured outside the care and resources of his family. What would it be like to have to rely on the goodwill of strangers for shelter, and food, and whatever answers that had brought her here? He wondered if she worried that he or his mother might put her out if she were too bothersome, before she could achieve the object of her quest. If he had tried to kiss her just then, would she have felt more secure, or more threatened?

“Come on,” he said, pushing himself to his feet and then reaching out a hand to help her rise too. He wanted to reassure her, but he wasn’t sure how, and they gathered up the fallen buckets in awkward silence.

* * *

Ubbe was just stirring from his pallet near the main hearth when he heard Aslaug awake with a sudden cry. He stood up instantly, peering past the partial screen closing off where the women slept. His mother’s eyes were wild with emotion, sitting up in bed, but she brushed off his concern as soon as she saw him looking. Just a nightmare, then.

The harsh rustling sounds of Aslaug adjusting the sheets and dressing for the day with forceful movements of the fabrics told Ubbe that her moodiness was not settling as she awoke, and that she was more angry than afraid. He pulled on a fresh tunic himself and prepared for the worst.

But when the storm broke, it went in a direction he hadn’t expected. “Why did you not tell us that you were being pursued?”

Ubbe rushed around the partition to see Aslaug straightening her apron and looming over Mikala, still in the borrowed underdress in which she slept, sitting crosslegged and nursing Djalo on their pallet by the small hearth on that side. Their guest looked at the locked door and shuttered windows of the cabin, attempting to determine the source of the accusation.

“You said you had come here to ask me about a spirit,” Aslaug clarified. “You neglected to mention that you are bringing it down upon my home.”

Ubbe found himself stepping cautiously into the small space, attempting to get himself between the two women.

Mikala’s eyes widened with realization. “You really _do_ have the Sight! Please, what did you see? Tell me what you have learned.”

“You had a vision, Mother?” Ubbe reached out to place a steadying hand on her shoulder, though her posture was as strong and straight as a sword.

Aslaug’s angry eyes flicked to her son. “I saw a great blackness descending over Kattegat, on her tail. She is bringing danger here, Ubbe.”

“Now?” Mikala asked sharply. “Is it here now?”

Aslaug assessed her with tight lips before speaking. “Time can be difficult to ascertain. It could be coming today, or a moon from now, or next year.”

Mikala grunted, brows creasing. Her eyes fell to her suckling child but it was clear she was thinking anxious thoughts.

“How could you fail to mention that such evil followed you?” Aslaug persisted. “How could you sit here and enjoy our hospitality knowing that every day it drew closer?”

“I did not think that he knew where to look for me, this time,” the young woman said softly. “I thought we would be safe for a while.”

“He?” Ubbe interrupted, rounding on Mikala as well. “It is a man that pursues you?”

“It _was_ a man,” the young woman corrected, jaw tight. “The spirit has transformed him. Now, it is only a beast.” She met Aslaug’s eyes again. “Does it truly know where to find me? What did you see?”

“An evil spirit. A great black thing. I could not determine its form, but yes, it was bestial. And it is connected to you.”

Mikala did not try and deny it. “I must know how to dispel this spirit. Destroy it. It is a curse that I must wash away. That is why I am here, what I seek. I cannot give up; it will never let my son and I rest.”

Her fervor trailed off at that last part, and Ubbe thought her eyes looked so hollow then, on the very edge of despair. Here, fully visible, was the sadness that infected her every smile. Something shifted in his chest. He looked back at his mother. “Do you know what this evil is?”

Aslaug held his eyes a moment, assessing his interest, before shaking her head. “The vision was not clear. But it is powerful, and it is dangerous, and it is full of hatred.”

“That it is,” Mikala said softly, tucking her breast away and bringing her son’s milk-drunk face to rest against her shoulder. She patted his back with a firm, steady rhythm and stared away at nothing.

“Ask the gods to tell you more, Mother.” Ubbe knew Aslaug’s visions came in two ways: some unexpected as she dreamed, but others at the end of a careful ritual in which she sought the spirit world more formally, for guidance. She did not consider the latter to be as true, but as Ubbe looked at the quiet desperation in Mikala’s face he knew that they must try everything they could. His mother was still angry, but he was not going to let her turn this woman and her child away now. “I need to know how to fight it.”

Mikala looked up at him sharply. She did not speak, but as Ubbe held her gaze he could see many emotions dancing behind her eyes: hope, surprise, and something uneasy beneath the rest.

Aslaug’s heavy sigh broke their moment. Ubbe turned back to his mother. “If it is coming here, we must protect our people,” he tried.

A bitter frown tugged at the corner of Aslaug’s mouth. “That is Lagertha’s responsibility now.”

Ubbe’s brows creased, and he made a chiding noise as he stepped closer to the exiled queen. “Or perhaps this is our chance to show the people of Kattegat which of Ragnar’s family holds the truest power.”

The ghost of a smile tugged at Aslaug’s cheek, despite herself. She may have been indulging in despair of late, but evidently she had not quite yet given up on influence over her lost throne. “Perhaps.” She turned back to Mikala, who only lifted her chin and met Aslaug’s gaze with urgency and hope, and waited for the other woman to speak.

Aslaug pressed her lips together, deciding. Ubbe thought he could see her anger warring with the new affections that had grown in her for their guests. It didn’t hurt that Djalo chose that moment to turn his face to the old queen and coo at her contentedly.  

“I shall seek more help from the gods,” she announced after a moment. Mikala sagged a little, relief releasing her features. “I will ask them for guidance. But there are some things that I need for the ritual that I do not have here. Herbs that grow only in summer.” She turned back to Ubbe. “You will have to go back into Kattegat, and see if anyone has any left for trade.”

It was women’s magic. Ubbe shifted on his feet, uncomfortable with the idea of being heard asking for such things. “Let me escort you there, Mother. I am certain Lagertha will not make trouble for you.”

Aslaug shook her head. “You are not certain of that. And it is not the right time for me to show my face and make her feel challenged.” When Lagertha took over Ragnar’s household, she made it clear his second wife was not welcome at the hall or in the town. Not wanting to offend the man she clearly wished to remarry, she had made sure to support the survival of his displaced family, if meagerly. But she did not want to see Aslaug at her door ever again. When they had learned of Ragnar’s death they all feared Lagertha would change her mind, but so far she had continued to treat his sons with respect, and allow them to take food and supplies she knew went to the comfort of his widow. “I will give you the names of a few women to seek out. Old friends who are likely to have what I need.”  


* * *

The bubbling of childish giggles rang out across the snowy landscape surrounding the road back to Kattegat.

“ _What_ are you two doing back there?” Mikala asked, craning her neck to try and inspect her son’s face over her shoulder.

“Boom!” Ubbe cried out when Djalo’s tiny fist contacted the palm of his hand. He threw his arms out wide and jumped back as if the boy had punched him hard enough to set him flying. Another round of giggles burst from Mikala’s back.

“Your son, he is as strong as the god Thor himself,” Ubbe explained, voice sing-song yet deep. “He is the most worthy foe I have ever faced.”

“Bé! Bé!” Djalo called insistently, waving his fist. It was the name he had started calling Ubbe, the best his developing tongue could do. “Boom!”

Ubbe raised his eyebrows and laughed. “Another ‘boom?’ Surely you have no thunder left,” he said with exaggerated arrogance as the boy grinned back at him. “My next attack is certain to defeat you.” Ubbe screwed his face up into a fearsome scowl, winding his arm up long and high before rushing back toward mother and child. This time Mikala watched as Ubbe swung down on them, suddenly slowing his movement as he got close to Djalo’s face. The boy didn’t even flinch, his tiny lips pulled back in that primal grin that is a cross between glee and ferocity. Ubbe’s open hand hovered before Djalo’s face, waiting for his infant reflexes to catch up and deliver his strike.

As soon as the little fist impacted his hand, Ubbe shouted “Boom!” again and spun his body away, yelping in feigned agony and staggering backwards ahead of them. This time Mikala and Djalo were both laughing.

“I am surprised he doesn’t get scared,” Mikala commented as they kept walking up the road. “You are making such terrible faces.”

“Djalo is fearless!” Ubbe boasted back to the young mother, looking fondly at the boy over her shoulder as he did. “And strong. And he will make a mighty warrior one day.”

Mikala, who had been beaming more with every word, scowled at Ubbe’s last comment. “Hunter,” she corrects. “Among my people, the most renowned men are skilled hunters.”

Ubbe ran a hand over his face, unsure why she found the distinction to be important but not willing to offend her further by questioning her. “He will be a great hunter,” he agreed. “Powerful, and tenacious. He, and all the ones that he loves, will never go hungry.”

His new words did not seem to sit any better with Mikala, though. Her eyes had slid to the side in that way she had when she was about to go silent and brood, and she added the extra bounce to her step that she used when she was trying to encourage Djalo to fall asleep. The boy called “Boom, boom,” again, but his enthusiasm was already weaker, his eyes drooping with the drowsiness that long walks never failed to enforce in him.

Ubbe came around to Djalo with twinkling eye and open palm, dampening his theatrics. When the babe lifted his fist, Ubbe swiveled his arm in a wide circle but did not jump away this time. “Boom,” he sang, at a more reasonable volume, and Djalo smiled but did not excite himself with more laughter. After only a few more gentle repetitions of the game, Djalo’s eyelids started to drift, and the next time Ubbe raised his palm the babe’s fist stayed resting on his mother’s shoulder.

They walked in silence for some time after that, giving Djalo a chance to fall more deeply asleep. Despite the current awkwardness, Ubbe was pleased that Mikala had desired to accompany him back up to the town. Not only did he enjoy her company, but this way she could be the one seen asking for the tools of women’s magic. Despite what he had said to his mother, he was not certain how Lagertha would have reacted to rumors that Aslaug was gathering supplies for _seidr_ today. Especially given her many very public accusations that her rival had practiced forbidden witchcraft to gain Ragnar’s love. It was for the best that Mikala be the one to collect these things.

As they walked through the snowy terrain, Ubbe found himself sneaking many glances at his mysterious companion. Ever since that moment by the river he had been craving time with her like this, away from his mother’s dominating presence. But Mikala’s calm-hearted mood, the one that had been starting to seduce him like a gentle promise of peace, had entirely evaporated today, leaving her instead pale and fretful. Whatever was coming for her, she feared it. She had clung to her son since news of Mother’s vision, and now kept checking on him even though he was now sleeping peacefully inside her parka’s hood as they trudged through the snow.

“What is it?” Ubbe asked suddenly, unable to stop the words from rumbling out of the tightness in his chest. “What are you running from?”

Mikala stopped short. Her eyes looked reproachful, and Ubbe felt his face flush. She was looking at him like his directness was terribly rude.

“I only mean that… I want to help you,” Ubbe babbled, attempting to recover. “The more I know about this spirit, the better I can prepare to protect you from it, if it catches you here.” That still felt too personal as her deep brown eyes, flecked with gold in the rising sun, stared back at him unblinking. “Or if it threatens any of my people. Is it? A threat to the people that live here?” He forced his tongue to still.

Mikala’s face was grim, and she nodded slowly. They stared at each other for another long moment; then she tipped her chin once more as if deciding something and resumed their hike toward Kattegat. “You feel responsible for the people here,” she commented, in that quiet way she had.

Ubbe cracked his neck and started after her. “I do.”

“But you no longer lead them.”

“I never did. But… I spent most of my life expecting that I would.”

“It is a strange way your people have,” Mikala said, “to take a man or a woman and decide that that one person will always know best about everything. And even stranger, you seem to think that the child of that person will also automatically make a good leader, too.”

Ubbe shrugged. “I am not certain that I would have made a good leader,” he replied, mimicking her simplicity. Memories of his disastrous choice outside York crowded him then, accompanied as always by half-formed fears of whatever Ivar may currently be doing on his bloody quest to prove his own prowess. He rubbed the phantom ache out of his eye socket and pushed the thoughts back. “It is not the same among your people, then?”

Mikala shook her head. “Sometimes an elder develops a reputation for wisdom, and they are always listened to with respect. We may treat one person as a leader for a little while, to organize a large hunt or a festival. But not all the time. Not like your kings and queens. It seems foolish, to automatically assume that the same person will be correct in every situation.” Her voice dropped, but Ubbe was fairly certain he understood her next words. “And when that does happen, it can lead to terrible things.”

 Ubbe could not disagree with that sentiment. Though he wanted to tell her too that when it is not clear who is in charge, the dark-hearted can find ways to sway men to ugly tasks, as well. But he kept his silence, and stared at her fur-clad back and they walked on. She had deflected his original question quite neatly. Still, Ubbe found he could not let it go. “Mikala,” he coaxed.

She did not turn, but he thought he saw her flinch.

“Let me help you. Tell me what you are up against.”

At first he thought that she was going to continue to ignore him, but then she snuck a wide-eyed glance over her shoulder. She quickly pretended she was only checking on the baby, who was still sound asleep. But she slowed in silent invitation, and Ubbe came to walk beside her.

She glanced over at him. Her eyes lingered on his sword, as they had several times before.

Ubbe stroked his hand absently across the pommel.

“Another thing my people do not have.”

“Swords?”

“War.”

Ubbe cocked his head and tried to rein in the incredulous noise coming from his throat.

Mikala’s lip twisted into the hint of a smile, though Ubbe could not tell if she were laughing at him or herself. “I am not saying that we never kill each other. But we do not carry out these “raids” your people do. We do not justify attacks on our brothers and cousins. We do not make tools specific to the purpose of taking a person’s life. In fact, anything that spills the blood of a man or a woman must be thrown away. It has become tainted.” Her mouth twisted like the thought was making her sick, and she wouldn’t make eye contact with him.

Ubbe looked down at the weapon strapped to his side. He had spent countless hours honing his skills with it, ever since he was strong enough to lift one. There was never a time that he hadn’t wanted to be a warrior; great like his father. And yet, the terrible sounds that filled the church at York were still ringing in his ears, if he ever listened for them. Was this the same sword he had carried that day? He pictured himself flinging it into the deep snowbank to his left.

“But perhaps,” she continued slowly, after filling her lungs with an audibly deep breath, “this is a tool that has a purpose. I do not think, after all, that the blood it might spill to defend us would count as human.”

“No?”

“He is only a monster now. A beast.” She glanced at Ubbe again. “Stronger than any man, too. The spirit gives him great claws, terrible jaws. His hide is so thick that there is very little that can hurt him.” She looked down at the sword. “That might, though.”

Ubbe dismissed the silly thought of throwing it away. “With a proper swing, a sword like this can cleave through bone with one strike,” he stated. He wasn’t really trying to impress her, but he felt compelled to try and make her feel safe with him. “It can take on any beast or man.”

She might have shuddered under her heavy coat. “We can hope it will not come to that. Your mother did not foresee how long it would take him to get here. Perhaps I will have already moved on.” Her face looked more worried than her words.

Ubbe ignored the disappointment that fluttered in his belly when she so casually mentioned leaving them. “I would still like to be ready.” The creature she was describing sounded like a bear. Bjorn had killed a great bear once, alone, with only his short knife and axe. Ubbe thought perhaps his own odds would be even better. Or would the length of his sword prove a liability, would a lumbering beast get inside his guard too quickly? Perhaps he should follow his half-brother’s example and carry many kinds of weapons.

There was one more thing Ubbe was burning to know. “Why is it pursuing you?”

Mikala scowled. Another question she considered too rude? So be it. Ubbe let the silence hang until she answered. “I… took something from him.”

Ubbe made a thoughtful noise. “Not something that can be simply given back, I’m assuming?”

“He never deserves to have it,” Mikala said between her teeth. “I will die first.”

Ubbe grunted his acceptance of her limit. “Then I will help you keep it. Is it something of power, that can help us defeat him?” In the stories, objects stolen from monsters and gods always had great significance, magical powers that gave the hero an edge.

“No,” Mikala simply said.

When it was clear she was not going to elaborate, Ubbe let out a frustrated noise. “You want our help, and yet you hold so much back. Why did you not tell Mother these things from the beginning? Do you not think such details would help you get your answers?”

“I have been to see many elders, shamans, people with reputations for wisdom. Many of them turned out to be charlatans. I have learned to wait and see who has the real power and the true knowledge, first. Who can confirm the things that I already know. That will be the person whose solution I will trust.”

Ubbe only grunted and trudged on. It made a kind of sense, though it vexed him that she did not trust him yet. “Mother is not a charlatan,” he said. The dragon Fafnir’s significance for his brother Sigurd may not have ever become clear, but she had predicted Ivar’s condition, and now that she had told Ubbe about her vision for him, the great beast that awaited… the meaning of which now seemed obvious. Killing the thing, and saving Mikala, had to be his destiny. Ubbe hefted his sword and began to whistle his favorite battle song as the frozen fjord and the town wrapped around its mouth came into sight below them.


	3. searching

Chapter Three

Mikala’s people were camped outside the fortified wall that Lagertha had built around Kattegat. Ubbe almost missed their houses at first; they were built mostly of thick blocks of compacted snow, and blended in with the surrounding terrain. Mikala explained that these were common shelters they used for hunting trips or other excursions, as they only took half a day to build and could last all winter, quite warm inside when lined with an inner roof of skins.

Dogs on long leashes came streaming out of the low entrances as they approached, barking and howling to herald their arrival. A few women poked their heads out next, hair plaited on either side of their faces just as Mikala wore hers. Only one smiled at the two of them, though they all seemed to recognize the girl. Then all the faces retreated, and Ubbe stopped walking when Mikala did.

The woman who had smiled re-emerged shortly, pulling on her parka and scolding the dogs who had not ceased their barking. She pushed the biggest one out of her way with a half-kick and then walked up to them. Ubbe noticed just a touch of unease under her friendly demeanor.

“The dogs still don’t like you,” the woman joked as she offered Mikala a quick embrace. Then she turned an appraising eye up to Ubbe’s face, gaze sliding over his shaved temples and long ponytail. “Or perhaps they are taking issue with your companion.” Her lip twisted when she looked at his sword, then her eyes whipped to Mikala’s back and a broad smile split her face. “Let me see that adorable baby.” Her lighthearted voice was already lilting for Djalo. “The moon has almost made a complete turn since I last saw him, I’ll bet he has already grown so much!”

Mikala twisted, offering a view over her shoulder. “He feels heavier,” she agreed with a smile, “but I think he is still sleeping. Though… I was wondering if I could leave him with you, Nuneta. Not for too long.”

Nuneta nodded as she answered, her hands already lifting. “A little one like this can make it hard to get anything done.” Her brows creased in curiosity, but Ubbe noted that she did not ask Mikala for any details about her business.

“If I can come inside with you, I will get him settled. He might even sleep the whole time I am gone.”

“I hope not,” Nuneta laughed as the women stepped away toward the low entrance to her dwelling. “I need to pinch those cheeks and see his beautiful little smile!” She had to grunt a few harsh commands at the dogs to get them to let Mikala come near, but eventually all their ears dropped and they allowed her to pass.

The two women crouched down to crawl into tunnel opening, Nuneta first. Ubbe, who hadn’t been invited inside, shifted awkwardly on his heels. He realized he hadn’t even been introduced. He had thought that the month they had just spent together had built some kind of relationship, but he suddenly wondered if Mikala even considered him a friend. Mikala held his eyes for a long moment before disappearing behind Nuneta’s heels, but he couldn’t tell what she was thinking.

Then it was just him, the suspicious dogs, and the distant sounds of the bustling city on the other side of the wall. Ubbe shrugged and dropped to his heels in a comfortable squat, extending one open palm and whistling softly at the nearest hound. The shaggy creatures looked like their brothers were probably wolves off running with a pack somewhere, but animals usually liked him. This dog just curled its lip, rumbling a low growl, and Ubbe gave up on trying to make friends fairly quickly.

* * *

Mikala seemed even more tense as they entered the city gates, eyes darting everywhere, fingers plucking at her coat. “Djalo will be alright,” Ubbe said, patting his hand tentatively on the tip of her shoulder, hazarding a guess at the reason for the change in her demeanor. “Nuneta seems like a very nice woman.” He guided her softly in the direction of the marketplace, where one of his mother’s friends often set up a stall of herbs.

“She is,” Mikala replied with a quick, mostly-false smile. Her eyes slid off Ubbe’s face almost as soon as they landed there. “I nursed him before we left. He should be fine for a while.” She sounded more like she was reassuring herself than him.

“A little independence is good for the boy,” Ubbe tried to quip, but Mikala didn’t laugh.

The buildings grew closer together as they approached the market district of the town, the weathered grey wood of the walls built to protect merchant families, and their goods, from the elements. Ubbe knew many stood empty, though they would begin to fill as soon as the winter ice broke free from the fjord. Even in this season, this part of Kattegat was filled with activity. Men and women bundled up in furs hurried past them with empty sacks and baskets, or strode up from the market square with full ones. As he watched them shiver and duck against the cold, Ubbe was especially grateful Mikala had altered his own fur mantle using some trick known to her people. Whatever she had done with her clever stitching, the cold could barely reach him below his chin.

Most of the sellers were set up under great awnings that sheltered them from the wind, determined even in this weather to sell their catches of fish, their surplus vegetables and winter handicrafts. “There are so many people here,” Mikala marveled.

A soft snort left Ubbe’s nose. “This is nothing,” he said. “The traffic through here triples in summer. And you should have seen it when we were gathering the Great Army. Kattegat was bursting at the seams.” 

“An ‘Army’?” Mikala asked, though her voice sounded distracted as she peered at the wares of every merchant’s stall they passed.

“Most of the warriors in Scandinavia came together here last year, to avenge the death of my father in the land of the Saxons. Many of them are still out there now, no doubt soaking their blades in more blood if Ivar is still in charge.”

Mikala’s brows creased. “The men do not stay near their families, to feed and protect them?”

“Some do. Enough of Lagertha’s still guard these walls. She did not deplete herself, did not risk very much supporting our army. Even though she claims to love our father, even though it is her son she declares to be Ragnar’s heir. Still she kept her strongest fighting force back from his vengeance.”

“Violence is not the way to show love,” Mikala said, with finality.

Ubbe took in a deep breath. He saw what she was getting at, and even wished that he could agree with her. What good had come from delivering vengeance upon Ragnar’s killers? Was anyone truly better off now? Though Ivar certainly thought he was. And after plundering two English kings, everyone was certainly a lot richer. Ubbe blew the air forcefully out through pursed lips. And for seeking peace in the aftermath of that vengeance, Ubbe’s name was tarnished while Ivar’s was toasted every night. “Maybe not for your people.”

An unkempt-looking man wrapped up in a soiled, ripped cloak stumbled suddenly into Mikala, grasping her arm for balance but refusing to let go once he righted himself. “You, girl,” he mumbled from behind a large, matted beard, half-closed eyes looking her up and down. “Is it you?”

Ubbe sighed, stepping up to push the man away with one hand on his sword. “Move along, Dag,” he said. He kept his arm locked straight, keeping as far away from the old drunk’s stink as he could. “You don’t know her, believe me.”

The dirty man frowned up into Ubbe’s face, like he was trying to place him. “She might be the one.” He bared yellowed teeth and clutched her sleeve harder, squaring off as if to remind Ubbe that he outweighed him even if he did not match him in height.

Ubbe ignored the old man’s nonsense. “You’re even more of a fool than I thought, if you think you can take me on,” he said, forcing his voice deep and loud. “A son of Ragnar.” He added the last part not out of vanity, but because he was not certain Dag even realized who he was today. It would be better to get him to back off, than to have to beat the town drunk in the street.

Thin realization dawned in the cloudy eyes attempting to stare him down, and Dag shook his head a little as he released Mikala’s arm. He mumbled a few incoherent words and rolled his eyes towards her again, but he backed away without giving them any more trouble.

Mikala’s wide eyes looked alarmed. “Who was that man?”

Ubbe spit on the ground beside his feet. “A nuisance. A drunk, a brawler, probably a thief. And now I think his mind is going too. Lagertha should do something about him.”

“No one takes care of him?” she asked, watching him shamble away.

“I think he may have had a wife, once. But nowadays no one can stand him. Not for long. I wonder how he’s even surviving this winter.”

Mikala’s eyes lingered until Dag disappeared into an alley between buildings.

“I suppose you are going to tell me next that layabout drunks are not a problem that you have in your village, either,” Ubbe teased.

Mikala just shook her head softly. “I have no village.”

Ubbe tried to catch her eye, not knowing what to say but hoping to convey his sympathy. Every time her sadness slipped like this it felt like his own heart was trying to leap out of his chest toward her.

He reached out, but her eyes tracked his hand warily and he froze before making any contact with her person. “Mother’s friend is just over there,” he said lamely, turning his reach into a gesture in the direction they had already been walking, toward a stall that had just come into sight. “Her name is Gerdr. The woman with all those baskets around her.” She sold all kinds of hard-to-find herbs and roots, mushrooms and barks that not everyone bothered to go to the trouble of gathering for themselves. Some of them were nothing but uncommon cooking spices, but plenty of her customers were preparing balms or hexes, too. Often enough that people found it interesting to talk about who they saw visiting her stall. Enough to make rumors fly if Ubbe Ragnarsson were seen to stop there. “Would you mind terribly if I didn’t go with you?”

If anything, Mikala looked relieved. “That would be fine. Actually, I have some other business to attend to today, after. Alone.”

Ubbe finally knew better than to follow his curiosity and try to ask for any more details. He had had enough of her cold stares today.

“Where should we meet?” She asked, looking briefly at the sky. “I should be done when the sun starts to dive beneath the treeline, I think.”

Ubbe swallowed the slight disappointment that bit at him when he realized they would not be spending the day alone together after all. “The Great Hall?” he offered. There was enough time to look up a friend or two and get into Lagertha’s ale before Mikala might have need of him again. Maybe it was for the best; maybe he’d been too long in the company of women lately. “Unless there’s a reason not to go there?” For him it was fine; there was nothing less suspicious than spending the afternoon right under the queen’s nose, getting drunk and looking bored. And maybe Margrethe was assigned to serve guests today.

“The hall is easy enough to find,” Mikala agreed. “I will come for you there when I am ready.”

Ubbe took half a step closer, lowering his voice. “You remember what Mother needs?”

Mikala’s smile mocked him just a little for asking. “Yes, she described them to me too. There was only one plant that I was not already familiar with.”

Ubbe looked away in discomfort. He was less unsettled by _seidr_ than most men, given who his mother was, but to think of Mikala as one of these uncanny women as well was… not his preference. “Then I leave it in your hands.”

She looked so small as she walked away from him along the busy market street, giant hood falling down her back and empty of its usual passenger. He wondered what her other business could be, and if it was the reason she had left her son with the other woman. Ubbe tried to imagine what Djalo was doing right now, and for half a breath he considered heading back to their camp to play with the child until Mikala was done. Then he laughed at himself and turned his feet squarely toward the home of one of his friends. Definitely too much time in the company of women.

* * *

The old songs felt good pouring out of Ubbe’s throat. He had convinced Storalf to leave his newly pregnant wife’s side for a few hours, and then found Beinir already in his cups and more than happy for an invitation to continue drinking in the Great Hall. Lagertha was not taking petitioners nor feasting anyone today, but Ubbe walked in like he owned the place and waved at the first thrall he saw for some ale.

The servants were the same as when he had lived there, for the most part, and they were not yet out of the habit of obeying him. He had settled into his usual seat at the center of the bench nearest the hearth, and soon more than just his two old friends started gathering around him. Lagertha was out on some errand or other; for the time being the hall once more belonged to Ragnar’s blood. As the ale flowed, someone started up a drinking song, and soon horns were crashing together as merry fists made a drumbeat on the long table.

“It is good to see you down here,” Beinir said when the song came to an end, pressing his shoulder against Ubbe’s. “Kattegat’s hall loses something when hosted only by women.”

“I would think such a situation would be your dream, my friend,” Ubbe joked back.

Beinir only scowled. “These women of Lagertha’s household are too serious.” He sat back, arms expansive. “I miss the old days, when we used to have the run of this place, with you and your brothers.” Beinir and Storalf had been Ubbe’s friends since childhood, and were guests here often after successful hunts or nights spent drinking so hard that they could not be trusted to stumble home to their own beds. Beinir leaned in close and whispered. “When are we taking it back?”

Ubbe raised an eyebrow, but kept the rest of his face still. “Are you and I going to defeat Lagertha’s whole army, or just the shieldmaidens that surround her at every step?” Lagertha had only become more paranoid after Harald Finehair’s furtive attempt on her holding, and his abduction of her lover.

Beinir’s eyes twinkled. “Storalf will hold off most of them for us. He’s been taking enough grief from his wife lately; if you put an ax in his hand and point him in the right direction he’ll easily have the strength of five men. We’ll clear a path for you, right to that bitch who stole your birthright.”

Ubbe rolled his eyes, but he couldn’t stop a smile from cracking his face. If anyone could do it, Storalf could. He had never been the kind that would raise a hand to his woman, but they all knew how stubborn he could get when he was frustrated with her. No one would ever win a sparring match with him on those days.

“Ubbe, I am serious,” Beinir pressed. “You have more support in Kattegat than you think.”

_No one is with you Ubbe! Everyone is with me._

Ubbe shook Ivar’s words out of his ear, pretending to brush away a fly when his friend looked at him quizzically. Beinir had been there that day, one of the only warriors that sailed beside him as their tiny fleet left the riverbank outside York. Though after Hvitserk jumped out of his boat, Ubbe could not stop himself from wondering if his friends had wished they could do the same. Especially now, as Beinir’s fierce words showed him how discontent even his own loyal men were with peace.

A spill of blonde hair cascaded over Ubbe’s shoulder as someone reached down to refill his drink. Margrethe. How long had she been at his back?

“I have been trying to tell him this, Beinir,” she said in her thin voice, locking her eyes on Ubbe’s. “To me, to many of us, you are still _Prince_ Ubbe. Kattegat, and all its wealth, should be yours.” The message in the set of her mouth, the way her hips turned toward his, was clear. _I am that wealth. I should be yours._

Ubbe hid his face in his cup, pulling as much of the thin ale into his throat as he could instead of answering. He held his cup out immediately for more as the two of them stared at him expectantly. “Perhaps.” His decision would not be rushed, but he could let the hungry dogs have some bone of hope to chew on. “Nothing will happen today. Might as well drink up.” He lifted his ale in a silent toast to Beinir.

Margrethe stood too close as Ubbe and his man drained their cups. Ubbe knew she was waiting for him to acknowledge her again, to continue to include her in his business, and today it only annoyed him.

She refilled Beinir first; was she trying to goad Ubbe by treating him as the less important man? He searched his feelings and found that he did not care in the slightest.

“I need a piss,” Ubbe said, setting his empty cup down rather than offering it to her pitcher. He stood abruptly and even then she did not move away from him; his body brushed along hers from hip to chest as he stepped off the bench and toward the front door. He was sure her determined eyes followed him out, but he did not turn to see.

The light outside seemed much too bright, and his steps too easy. The cold air had no bite. Perhaps Lagertha’s ale was not as thin as he had thought. He held one hand to his head as he went to piss around the side of the building.

He reviewed the exchange he had just walked away from with the delayed thoughts that confirmed his drunken state. Why did he feel so angry? Ubbe barely understood himself. York had changed him, he knew that. The shame of his failure in bidding for peace, and the way Ivar had twisted it to take everything away from him; those things had helped too.

But no one seemed to see that he was different now. He was no longer the carefree young man that dreamed of glory and fame, and who enjoyed claiming the woman that he had known Hvitserk and Sigurd also desired. Oh gods, Sigurd. Pain stabbed his chest, as real as any knife’s blow, at the sudden memory of the way his brother’s eyes used to go round and wistful when he looked at Margrethe. All those little victories Ubbe had felt when he stole the girl away, before his little brother gathered his courage, turned to bitterness so strong he thought his stomach might upend.

He wondered if Margrethe knew how important she had been to Sigurd. He should tell her. When piss and nausea both had left his body, Ubbe turned back toward the street.

But when he emerged onto the thoroughfare, his feet carried him in the opposite direction. He wasn’t quite ready to face the expectant eyes of these few people who still believed in him. Ubbe wandered aimlessly through the market instead, not even knowing what he was searching for. The familiar streets were taunting him somehow. If he just turned the right way he would find… he knew not what. Something missing.

He stopped for a long time before a bench next to a water trough in the central square, not sitting down. Sigurd used to like to sit there, and play his oud for the amusement of anyone, everyone. Ubbe could almost see him there now; everything was the same except for the color of the pennants hanging from the buildings. But even here Ubbe saw the axe-head embed once again in Sigurd’s flank, felt the lurch in his stomach of the disaster he could have averted, should have averted, if he had just stopped hoping Ivar wasn’t what he really was.

It appeared then to Ubbe that the seat of Sigurd’s favorite bench bubbled up red with dark blood, spilling out to drip on the hard-packed earth. It disappeared as soon as he blinked.

Had Sigurd made it to Valhalla, or was he chosen for Freja’s hall? A far more terrible thought needled at the back of his mind. Can a ghost rest at all, if his family could not be bothered to fulfill the revenge obligation?  If they chose his killer over his memory, his honor?

Someone bumped into his back. A heavy hand closed over Ubbe’s shoulder. From the ragged sleeve he saw out of the corner of his eye, Ubbe assumed it was Old Dag at first, and he turned with an irritated exhale to square down the misguided drunkard for a second time.

It wasn’t Dag. The unkempt hair and layers of dirty wrappings were the same, but this man was much larger, as tall as Ubbe himself. His eyes were feral and calculating, and seething with ill-intent. “You,” he growled. He leaned in and took a deep inhale of the fur wrapped around Ubbe’s neck. “You have been near her.” His voice stuck and caught at odd intervals, crawling out of his throat like he hadn’t used it in days. “Where is my woman?”

Ubbe tried to step away, but the wild man did not release his grip. His eyes were the same thin shape as Mikala’s, marking him as a man of the far North. “What are you talking about?” Ubbe barked back, blood rushing to his limbs as his body prepared for a fight. “Get your hand off me or I’ll take it off for you.” Ubbe’s fingers closed around the worn leather pommel at his waist, and he bared a foot of steel before the other man could even react.

“Where did you get this pelt, Viking?” the man insisted, twisting it in his fist. He did not even acknowledge the threat, narrowing his eyes until Ubbe could barely see his bloodshot sclera.

Whoever this was, Ubbe knew that he wanted him nowhere near Mikala. The pelt was his own kill, and he had been wearing it for years, but the man must have recognized the way she had re-stitched it.  A believable lie formed in Ubbe’s mind, one that would lead in the wrong direction. “In the market. From some traders.” The wild man studied his face. “A moon ago.” Ubbe shook his arm again, pulled his sword another hands-breadth from its scabbard. “I won’t tell you again: let me go. I am not someone you want to trifle with.”

The stranger finally looked down at Ubbe’s naked steel, new calculations passing behind his eyes. He grunted once and released him. He did not show any signs of fear. “A moon ago, you say.”

“At least,” Ubbe said, keeping his chin high, as he dropped his sword back into its scabbard in the way that made the most amount of noise.

The man turned away without a word, without a sound, without the slightest physical acknowledgement that they had been having a conversation which was finished now. He continued down the market lane, the same way Ubbe had been walking, head swiveling to examine everyone and everything that he passed.

Ubbe did not take his hand from his sword until the man was out of sight. _My woman,_ he had said. Did Mikala have a husband? Was that Djalo’s father? Or was something else going on?

 


	4. here

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much to everyone that has been following along and encouraging me in this one. Mikala and her world are really starting to come to life for me, and I am so blessed to have people to share this progress with!

Ubbe took the long way back to the great hall, alert for the sight of dark plaited hair, or the cream-and-brown pattern of Mikala’s deerskin coat. A strong protective urge was making it difficult for him to simply wait for her, as they had planned. Not with that suspicious man out there. But he also did not want to wander in his search for long, in case she was already looking for him right where he had said he would be. The sun was angling low; it was just about the time she had told him to expect her already.

There was no sign of Mikala along his way, nor did he see her when Ubbe pushed open the heavy doors and assessed the occupants of the longhouse. Storalf and Beinir, however, were right where he had left them, heads together, and they both stood when they noticed Ubbe’s return.

“There he is! Cock finally drained?” Storalf’s deep voice roared. Ubbe had to think a minute to realize his friend was referencing the excuse he had used when he left the hall. It felt like days had passed since then. He tried to determine how long he had actually been out as he watched Storalf and Beinir approach him with teasing smiles. At least enough time for him to sober up a bit, and for them to get drunker.

“That blonde takes good care of you, eh?” Beinir added, grabbing Ubbe’s arm and pulling him back toward their bench. Margrethe was no longer anywhere in sight. They must have assumed she had met him out back for a romp.

“Now that your mind is more clear,” Storalf grinned, clapping him on the back, “there are some people I want you to talk to.” His hand was heavy on Ubbe’s shoulder as he steered him back to his seat. Lagertha and her inner circle were still absent, but there were a few more of the local men at the table now, and even a knot of shieldmaidens with dour faces. “Folk who share our… discontent.”

Alarm and exhaustion both flared at once as his friends pulled him into yet another hushed conversation about treason. Ubbe raised his eyebrows in feigned interest, but the words swirled around his head without touching him. It was flattering, the way they all wanted to offer him kingship. But he did not want to spill the blood of kin and neighbors to get it. The certainty of that crystallized more firmly around his heart the longer this talking went on.

And he was still worried about Mikala, and the intentions of the man he had met in the market. Or was it simply a coincidence? Perhaps the ill-tempered stranger was looking for some other wayward seamstress who just happened to be of Mikala’s people.

Ubbe was actually grateful when Margrethe interrupted them all, inserting herself into his conspiring little circle once again. Her face was flushed from running, her eyes wild with gossip. “Blood—” she panted, “—blood spilled in the market.”

That got everyone’s attention. Ubbe’s mind flashed to Mikala and the rough man. His chest seized up. ~~~~

“Old Dag, that drunkard,” Margrethe continued, and Ubbe started breathing again. “They found him in an alley. Behind one of the storehouses.” Then she leaned in dramatically. “His belly was ripped open. They said his kidneys and his liver are missing. And—” she paused to give a significant look to each of the listeners, “both of his eyes.”

Ubbe shuddered, as many at the table did too. More than one hand went to finger a protective amulet.

“Who would do such a thing?” someone asked.

“And in broad daylight,” Ubbe mused. “I just saw him today, before I came to get you, Storalf. Acting strange, though that’s usual for him.”

Beinir grunted, unconcerned. “Maybe someone finally called in one of his debts.”

“Maybe he saw something he shouldn’t have seen,” someone else suggested, miming the gouging out of eyes.

“Then what are they doing with the liver?” one of the shieldmaidens asked.

“And the kidneys,” another reminded her. “Has anyone heard of such a thing?”

And then the inevitable question: “Do you think Lagertha will do anything about it?” Meaning, _will there be anything to be gained if we figure it out first._

The doors of the hall creaked open, drawing Ubbe’s attention immediately. And, therefore, the eyes of most of the people at his table. Relief flooded him as soon as he recognized Mikala’s broad face. She took a few awkward steps inside, scanning the room for him, and before Ubbe knew it his feet were bringing him toward her.

Her color looked better than it had this morning, but her face was still drawn and tight. His breath stopped for a moment when she broke into a smile at his approach; a small one, but a smile nonetheless.

“You are safe,” Ubbe said. He almost touched her to be sure.

Mikala’s smile turned into a smirk. “Did you think I might not be?” She tipped her head quizzically. “Kattegat may be the biggest town I have ever seen, but I have been taking care of myself alone for a long time, Ubbe of the Longship People.”

Is that what her people called his? “Of course,” Ubbe replied. Her playful tone surprised him, more confident than he had seen her in days. But he found he was too preoccupied to enjoy the chance to banter. “It is only that… I met someone in the market today.” He tried to warn himself off another direct question but he was too impatient, and tired of games. “Mikala, do you have a husband?”

All that new color drained right out of her face. “Who did you meet?”

Ubbe crossed his arms, shifting his stance. That wasn’t a ‘no.’ Something thickened in his chest. “A big man, dirty, and very cross. One of your people. He asked if I knew where ‘his woman’ was.”

She seemed to shrink with every word he spoke. Her eyes darted side to side, thoughts making connections. “Djalo,” she suddenly whispered, and whirled back toward the door.

Ubbe caught her elbow, halting her flight. “He’s after the boy?”

Mikala’s teeth bared like a cornered badger’s. “They won’t be able to stop him. I have to get there first.” Her fear shone in her eyes. She shook him off and ran to the door.

Ubbe glanced back at his friends. Beinir was looking at him quizzically. Storalf’s eyes were on Ubbe’s hand: already gripping hard around the pommel of his sword. _They won’t be able to stop him._ But surely he could. He had faced down bigger men than that stranger.

He could ask his friends to come help, but they would lose so much time questioning him. Who was that girl? Why should they get involved in her domestic squabbles? They would try to tell him he had more important things to be doing. Margrethe was glaring up at him too, mouth pinching down to almost nothing as she contemplated his distraction with a mysterious female.

The door hadn’t even swung shut behind Mikala before Ubbe was pushing through after her.

* * *

Their arrival to the traders’ camp was anticlimactic. Despite Mikala’s anxiety, all was as it should have been: the dogs barking and howling, the women looking grumpy at another disturbance. Nuneta denied any visitors, and Mikala was not any more forthcoming with details with her than she had been with Ubbe. “I am going now,” was all Mikala would say to her, voice clipped as she gathered Djalo to her. “And you will not see me again. If anyone does come asking after me, tell them I went south. Many days ago.”

Nuneta was silent for a moment, furrowing her brows as she watched Mikala settle Djalo onto her back. The boy looked drowsy, and uttered a few cranky noises. “Did we make a mistake, bringing you with us?” she finally asked.

Mikala’s stance hardened, but she did not answer. “Did Djalo stay on the bed, the whole time he was in there with you?”

“Yes,” she answered, twisting the word quizzically.

“Change the cover,” Mikala advised, already turning to go. “Hide the old skin until you leave here. Or better yet, burn it.” Then she strode away toward the treeline, and did not stop until the camp was no longer visible behind their backs.

Djalo started crying as soon as his mother’s movements ceased. Ubbe rushed to soothe him, hoping to do anything to help, but Mikala had already started swinging him down to offer her breast. Her eyes darted between the trees as she got her son situated inside the front of her coat.

“What is going on, Mikala?” He couldn’t help if he didn’t understand.

“Quiet! I am trying to think.” The woman was trembling, visibly. A part of Ubbe ached to see her so fearful, but his doubts were creating distance now. Who was this man to her, and what kind of claim did he have? Why did she think he would go after Djalo? Just as he opened his mouth to question her again, she spoke first. “Where did you see him? How long ago?”

“The market. On the east side. Not too long before you came into the longhouse.” Ubbe watched Mikala turn her head in thought, but her worried expression did not change. “Who is he?”

“Not my husband,” she said quickly. The words came with a trace of venom, as if she were disgusted with Ubbe for even assuming that.

The outburst warmed him more than Ubbe wanted to admit. “There is something else,” he remembered suddenly. “A man was found dead near the market around the same time. That old drunk that stumbled into you. He was torn up, like a wild animal was eating him.”

Mikala did not look very surprised.

“They are connected?”

Her eyes were bitter; weary and sharp. “The beast is here.”

Ubbe looked around uneasily, scanning for any signs of movement.  He suddenly felt very exposed. “And that man… travels with it?”

Mikala’s level gaze looked just a bit disappointed in him.

“Mikala,” Ubbe said, voice hardening as he realized. “You told me a spirit was pursuing you. A monster.”

“And this monster can make himself look like a man,” she said, matching his tone. “Do not be fooled.”

Ubbe blew out an exasperated sigh, embracing the hot emotion that flooded in to cover his embarrassment at missing the truth. “Why can you not be more forthcoming? If I had known, I could have killed him right there.”

“You could not have.” There was not a trace of doubt in her voice. “Safer that you did not try.”

Ubbe stiffened, puffing up into his fighting stance. “You doubt my skills as a warrior?” He did not mean to threaten her when he placed his hand on the pommel of his sword. He just needed her to see him for all the strength he had to offer.

Djalo cried from inside her coat, a piercing, demanding noise that was unusual for the good-natured child. Ubbe sagged as Mikala let herself be distracted in shushing him, switching him to her other breast.

“What did you say to him?” Mikala asked, eyes focused again on the spaces between the trees. The angled rays of the low winter sun made everything in the forest appear off-color and oddly shaped.

“He accused me of having been with you. He acted like he could smell you on my fur.”

“He could,” she said casually. “It was only a few days ago that I mended it for you.”

Ubbe blinked at her.

“His nose is keener than any dog’s.” She looked at him like she was standing at the top of a rise, just waiting for him to catch up. “He is not a man, Ubbe.”

Ubbe wiped his face and swallowed. Was this everything, or was there more she wasn’t telling him? He wanted to ask her why she had been so afraid for her son.

Djalo kept fussing, and Mikala shushed him more impatiently than Ubbe had ever heard her do. “So he asked about me,” she continued when he settled. “And what did you tell him?”

“I lied.” Her dismay had got his back up a little. “I understood enough to not lead him to you, at least.” He crossed his arms high over his chest. “I told him that I bought the fur from traders who had already left town.”

Mikala settled back on her heels, pressing her lips together as she thought. “That might have been enough.” She scanned the trees again. “Or he might be following you now.”

Ubbe straightened, couldn’t resist looking back at the way they had come. “I went back to the longhouse after that, and sat there until you came.”

“Hm. If he had been watching the building, he would have grabbed me right then,” Mikala reasoned. “If he means to track you, he hasn’t started yet.” She sighed at Ubbe’s raised eyebrow. “If he was close enough to smell me on that pelt, he has your scent now too.”

Djalo struggled inside her coat until Mikala pulled him out. The boy had nursed more quickly than usual, and his eyes were bright now. His little head swung like he was trying to look at everything at once. Ubbe thought his mother’s anxiety must be infecting him.

“If he wants to find me again, everyone in Kattegat knows who I am. So if he means to track me like a man, rather than like a beast, he won’t have a hard time of it that way either.” He refused to let the sensation currently worming through his gut show at all in his eyes.

Regret flashed across Mikala’s face anyway. “I am sorry to have brought such danger into your life.” Ubbe tried to wave her off valiantly, but she kept talking. “I shall leave as soon as I can. Before he catches up to me,” she promised. “I just…” she trailed off, looking guilty. “I still need your mother’s guidance, to know where to go next.”

“To find the way to destroy this monster?” Ubbe’s hackles were rising again. “We do not need visions for that answer. Let me gather my best warriors and find him, right now. He will not be able to follow you anymore when his head is severed from his body.”

“Are you sure of that, Ubbe, son of Ragnar?” A dreadful image pierced his mind, of the man’s headless body shambling after him. “Do you not think I have tried such a simple solution?”

Ubbe’s eyes went wide. “What happened?”

Djalo insisted on being put down, quieting only after being allowed to stand on his own, clinging to his mother’s legs for balance. His thin deerskin shoes would get wet in the snow eventually, Ubbe thought, but they could humor the child for a little while.

“Many men fell upon him,” Mikala said as she straightened, “with axes and knives. And he killed every one.” She held his gaze unflinching, eyes hard and haunted. “His strength is not human; it comes from the evil spirit inside him. I think we must defeat the spirit to weaken the man.”

Ubbe filled his lungs, holding his breath tight in his chest as he looked down at her terrified and determined face. He had only her word to go on. Her pursuer had seemed but a man when they crossed paths in the market. But: a man who could scent a woman off her needlework; a weaponless man who showed no fear at all at the sight of Ubbe’s blade. He exhaled in a burst, releasing his skepticism. “Then our only choice is back to Mother, as quick as we can.” He looked down at the embroidered bag attached to Mikala’s belt. “Did you get everything she asked for?”

“Everything but the dried woodruff. But the woman in the market told me Hrefna, who lives up in the hills, might have some left.”

Ubbe nodded. “I know this woman. I have not seen her in a long time, but she used to consult with my mother. I think she would be willing to help.” He raised his face to the darkening sky. “It is already so late. But if we hurry, we can be at her door before the sun is completely gone.”

Mikala shook her head, even as she gathered Djalo back up amid his whimpering protests. “I have made enough mistakes by hurrying already.” She held her son up to her face and broke into a fierce grin for him. “It was worth it,” she sang softly, “to make sure you are safe, little man.”

Djalo smiled back and her, babbling “Ma ma ma. Play!”

Mikala’s smile was kind even as she shook her head. “We cannot stop right now. But Ubbe and I are going to play a walking game, my love.” Mother and child both looked over at Ubbe, Mikala’s face sobering again. “He is going to find my trail leading into this camp. I have neither the time nor the power to undo that. But with a little patience, we can hide where we go next.”

She looked down at the snow, pointing to the deep tracks they had left on their way up here. The thin cut their boots had made in the drift widened out beneath their feet where they had stopped and paced around a little, talking to each other. Ubbe watched as Mikala took two deliberate strides past this point, continuing in the direction they had been walking. The second foot fell with a twist, and much heavier than the first. Then she rocked her weight back and hopped in reverse to his side again. Djalo laughed in her arms like this was a very fun game indeed. “What are you doing?”

A fire was returning to Mikala’s eyes, simmering up past the fear. “He has been tracking me a long time. He knows that I have two tricks I can use to evade him. I am making it look like I used one of them just now, to go that way.” She drew something from a pouch at her belt, and flung a handful of some reddish gravel over the snow surrounding her false tracks, which pointed toward the fjord. “Put your weight into a footprint next to mine,” she instructed. “Just in case he is tracking you too.”

Ubbe’s mind was filling with questions, but he did just as she said. “What is he supposed to think, that we suddenly began to weigh nothing, and flew over the snow?”

“Something like that,” Mikala answered cryptically. Djalo was struggling in her arms again, not content with their stillness.

Ubbe abandoned arguing about such a ridiculous idea in favor of helping with Djalo. He held out his hands out toward the boy, silent offer smoothing his face. Mikala’s arms tightened protectively and Ubbe started to pull back, but Djalo kicked his legs eagerly. “Bé, Bé!”

Ubbe shone his most reassuring smile at Mikala as she handed her son over. He swung Djalo high and low, though he was careful not to make him laugh too loud. Distracting the babe made him feel better, too. A little of his anxiety bled off as he gazed into the boy’s playful eyes. “And what was the dust you threw?”

“Evidence of the spell I want him to think I cast.”

“Oh, you can cast spells now, can you?”

Mikala just looked at him, with the same uncanny face his mother made when men doubted her powers. Ubbe was once again painfully aware of how little he knew about this girl. “And now,” she said matter-of-factly, “we walk backwards for a while.”

At least this was a measure Ubbe was familiar with. They did their best to fit their feet inside their original tracks until they reached the trampled-down snow surrounding the traders’ camp. When Djalo got bored of watching his mother, Ubbe propped him up to look over his shoulder and asked over and over, “Am I going the right way, Djalo? What do you see?”

The boy responded with shrill giggles that echoed across the silent snow. Ubbe winced and tried to keep his own voice low, but reasoned that a crying baby still would have been louder.

* * *

It was well after dark, though not yet time for the evening meal, by the time they approached Hrefna’s cottage tucked into the hills above Kattegat. Ubbe had all his amulets pulled out and laid over his coat, hoping to deter any draugr that might be roaming nearby. They had more to fear than just Mikala’s monster, being out here without the sun.

After they retraced their steps to Lagertha’s new city gates, Mikala had stopped Ubbe and drawn out another handful of that red sand. “We will rub this on our soles, and put some inside our boots, and then Arawk will not be able to follow us by scent for a while.” Ubbe had tried not to be bothered by Mikala referring to her pursuer now by a name, so familiar.  When he sat down and pulled his boot off, she had shifted uncomfortably, averting her eyes. She made him turn around before she would remove her own boots. He tried to think of a time she had revealed her feet in front of him before, and could not.

The grit had irritated his heels the whole way up to the cottage; luckily it lay much closer than the hunting cabin that had become his and Aslaug’s residence. He was almost limping by the time they approached the old woman’s door. From the way Mikala’s steps minced, she must have been suffering too. “Hrefna!” he called out. “It is Ubbe, son of Ragnar. And of Aslaug. May we have shelter under your roof?”

After a long moment where Ubbe shifted foot to foot, unable to decide which one hurt worse, the door cracked open. A warm line of firelight spilled onto the snow as a head crowned with iron-grey braids poked out. “And who is this with you, Aslaug’s son?”

“Mikala, of the Snow Hare People,” she answered for herself, stepping forward. “And my son Djalo.”

Ubbe paused; it was the first time Mikala had ever named where she came from. He wondered if that was what all the Northern folk called themselves, or if it were some kind of family name. He had never bothered to learn much about her people, who only occasionally visited his lands, before now. He suddenly wished very much that he had.

It was enough for Hrefna. “Yes, you may share the shelter of my roof and the warmth of my hearth.” She waved them inside, adding: “Come on in before a ghost catches you. I do not like the color of this night.”

Ubbe hadn’t been thinking about it, but he looked up and supposed there was a slightly violet cast to the indigo blackness above their heads. He silently gave thanks to Odin for protecting their steps this far as he followed Mikala inside.

Hrefna’s cottage was small and cluttered, but neatly kept. A pot bubbling over the hearth was releasing a complex, savory scent that made Ubbe’s stomach growl almost instantly. Chains of herbs, roots, and grasses hung from all of the rafters on one side; sausages and vegetables dominated the other. For a female living alone, Hrefna looked quite well provided for. And she was already taking down some more meat to add to her stew.

“You know better than to travel at night, Ubbe Ragnarsson,” the old woman tutted at him, slipping the sausages in the pot and then taking down a bunch of thin yellow carrots. “You’ll have to sleep here now, and wait for the light.”

Mikala smiled warmly and tried to take the roots from Hrefna’s hands. “Let me cut these for you.” Djalo took the same moment to start protesting his confinement to the little cocoon on her back; the change in air must have woken him.

“Sounds like you’re about to have your arms full with him, dear,” Hrefna replied with a smile, keeping the carrots to herself. She stepped over to an ancient wooden table and cleared a space to chop them.

There were two chairs by the hearth. Ubbe dropped with a grateful noise into one of them, finally taking the pressure off his feet. He rushed to remove both boots, desperate to clear out the bits of gravel he was certain he’d find embedded into his skin. Of course, his stockings had prevented that, but he felt compelled to strip them off too. His groan was almost obscene as he ran his palms over his bare sole, soothing half a dozen irritated marks that were threatening to turn to blisters.

When he looked up, Mikala’s face was bright red. She looked away without saying anything, busying herself with getting Djalo settled, but she had an air of extreme discomfort. Ubbe looked down at his foot, trying to figure out what was wrong. Aside from the angry red wheals, it was unmarred, and clean. A little pale, but not ill-formed like Ivar’s. He wiggled his toes as he eyed the dusting of light hair growing between the knuckles. It was a good foot, he thought defensively. Mikala did not look in his direction again. He rubbed it one more time before shaking out his stocking and covering it up again.

They traded pleasantries as the pot bubbled, softening the additions to the meal Hrefna had only been planning for one. She did not seem to be put out one bit by the unexpected company. “Now,” Hrefna said when the food was ready, after getting everyone settled with bowls and spoons, “What brings a princeling to my doorstep?”

“Woodruff,” Ubbe replied, the word coming out only barely comprehensible around his mouthful of rich sausage. Hrefna was a much better cook than Aslaug. “For Mother.”

Hrefna sat back in the chair Mikala had ceded to her, chuckling softly. “She’s ready to make a move, is she? What’s she calling down?”

Ubbe shook his head, trying to choose a careful reply and finish chewing the morsel in his mouth at the same time.

“What? It can’t be for a love spell,” Hrefna said, though he noticed her eyes sliding to Mikala and back, “and the only other thing woodruff is good for is a summoning.” She tapped her spoon against her bowl. “I have to say, I’m a little cross she hasn’t pulled me into her plans before now. Or is that why your mother sent you? She knew how curious I’d be when you asked for herbs…”

Ubbe could barely keep up. He had forgotten what a busybody this woman could be. 

“It is for me,” Mikala interrupted, setting her bowl on the ground before her, untouched.

Hrefna regarded her silently for a moment, her mind no doubt struggling to paddle back up the frantic current of her thoughts. “The Queen is summoning the spirits for you?”

Mikala nodded, face settling into a guarded expression. Ubbe wondered why she had spoken up at all, when she was usually so ready to sit back and let people make their assumptions. When she always treated him as if his questions were impolite.

“Don’t you have your own people for that?” Hrefna asked.

Mikala dipped her spoon in the broth and offered it carefully to Djalo, who was standing beside her and clinging to her shoulder. “They could not find the answers I seek.”

Ubbe wondered afresh exactly what sort of answers Mikala was looking for. She said men with stone tools could not hurt this creature, but there were so many other practical measures that could be tried. In the songs, great enemies always had fatal weaknesses. Had she tried fire? Drowning? Cold steel?

“You came here for her visions,” Hrefna concluded.

“None of the story-keepers can tell me what to do. I thought perhaps a woman who receives signs from the gods might give better counsel.”

“Because your spirits won’t talk to you.”

Mikala started, then pressed her lips together and gave Hrefna a flat look. “Because your people seem more acquainted with bloodlust, and violence. Even against your own brothers. Perhaps one of you Vikings might better recognize a creature that does the same.” She may have meant her words to scald the old woman, but Ubbe felt them like a burning knife thrust into his own back.

Hrefna only smiled. “And has she? Recognized it?”

The two women sized each other up for a few silent moments. Ubbe felt like he was missing something. “Not yet,” he answered for her, feeling compelled to intervene. “So Mother is going to ask for guidance, to help Mikala in her search.”

 Hrefna turned her shrewd gaze back to Ubbe. He suppressed an impolite shudder; it felt like she was reading something in the air around him. Perhaps his mother was not the only woman in town with the Sight. “How kind of her. And you, Ubbe. To help this girl who is so far from her home.” Her voice was not quite as warm as her words. “Knowing so little about her.”

Ubbe’s lip twitched in irritation. Now he was certain that there was some kind of implication that he just could not pick up on. “I know that she and her boy are in trouble. And I know that she has a good heart. What more is there than that?” His mind flashed to Mother’s great wolf again, his destiny.

Hrefna’s gaze shifted between him and Mikala. Ubbe imagined she could see some kind of thread connecting them. It certainly felt as if there was; how else could he explain turning his back on his friends, and his most recent lover, to end up trudging through the night with rocks in his shoes?

Ubbe let his eyes drift back to Mikala too. The girl had succeeded in getting Djalo to slurp one taste of the rich broth, but now he seemed more interested in getting the spoon out of her grip than anything else. Maybe it was just the babe that had ensnared him. He could not tolerate even the thought of that child in danger, in the clutches of any beast…

The old woman sat back with a grunt. “Well. Not to steal thunder from the great Aslaug, but I’ve seen quite a few things of the spirits in my day, too. And heard ten times as many stories as that. Why don’t you tell me more about what you are looking for, Mikala of the Snow Hare People? Perhaps I have heard of it. Maybe I can also be helpful to you.”

Mikala had finally convinced Djalo to accept a small portion of meat into his mouth. She watched closely as he sucked on it, tried to chew with his gums and one tooth while she moved her own jaw in encouragement. When she answered Hrefna, she did not look up. “What do you know of spirits that can affect men’s minds?”

Ubbe remembered what she had told him, about how she tested people’s knowledge by revealing her own information only slowly. He wondered why she had chosen to start with that particular detail.

The old woman shifted in her seat, making a contemplative noise. “Well, the elves are always making mischief, and they have been known to influence moods.”

Mikala shook her head softly, politely letting Hrefna know that this was not the kind of creature she was searching for.

“Hm. Well. You are correct when you say that many of our gods are interested in bloodshed. They of course can influence the mind. They encourage us to seek the glory of war, and they enjoy the taste of blood at a sacrifice…” she spoke slowly, watching Mikala’s reaction to every word.

“And what do your gods do, when they taste blood?” Mikala asked.

Hrefna’s smile was broad. “Make the crops grow. Turn the winds in our favor. Give us victory over our enemies.”

Mikala’s lip curled, touched with scorn. “This…” she trailed off, holding herself back. Ubbe thought about their earlier conversations, about the differences between her people and his. He imagined she was biting off some choice words about gods who favored violence. “What I am looking for is not a god. Its powers do not extend as far as all that.”

Hrefna gave another thoughtful grunt. “Well then. There are the _delani…_ they are spirits of jealousy. They are attracted to those who have been wronged, or overlooked.” Mikala’s eyebrows jumped, though she said nothing. “They settle into a home, invisible. They like to hide in the eaves, or upon the rafters. They incite their victim’s anger, feeding off their frustration. They cause infertility, sickly crops, and often kill children.”

Mikala shook her head again. To Ubbe’s eyes she looked weary, and trying to cover it over with politeness so as not to offend their host. To be trying to find some specific truth inside everyone’s ghost stories… he suddenly appreciated how overwhelming her quest must have been. Every skald that passed through his mother’s court had a new type of horror to tell them about, monsters from the east or the west, the mountains or the coasts. No one assumed every one of them to be real. How could Mikala possibly decide which information to believe? No wonder she had decided instead to travel many lonely miles on her own in search of a true Seer, some way to ask her questions more directly.

“This is not the same spirit. But I wonder, how does one dispel this _delani?_ ”

“You want to know how to drive away your spirit.”

“Yes. Of course,” Mikala answered, sounding a touch defensive. “This is why I have traveled so many miles.”

Hrefna gave her that measured look again, then seemed to come to some conclusion, softening toward the girl. “To get rid of the _delani_ , you put out all the hearth fires, turn your furniture upside down, then fast and burn salvia until it gets annoyed enough to leave.”

“Because it infects the house.”

“Yes. Probably not the cure you are looking for then, eh?”

Mikala shook her head again.

Hrefna gave her a wry smile, admitting defeat. “Then I suppose Aslaug is indeed your best bet.” Djalo chose that moment to become very interested in trying to open the sacks that lined the wall behind them, and Mikala’s attention wavered as she moved to redirect him. Hrefna continued: “Though perhaps, there is one offer I can make you, that might fit your need.” Acknowledging the young mother’s distraction, Hrefna turned to Ubbe. “I’ve got something better than that grit she put in your shoes,” she said, taking his empty bowl from him. “If you happen to have any gold from your Daddy’s hoard left.”

“Better for what?” Ubbe asked guardedly.

“That _kofe_ dust, it erases your scent, if you apply it the right way, with the right words.” She flicked her head at Mikala, struggling with her complaining son. “Her people usually use it to help their hunters get close to game, but I’m guessing right now, you two are trying not to be tracked.”

Ubbe glanced at Mikala before he answered, wrestling Djalo into her lap. Her slight nod allowed him honesty. “Yes.”

“I know a charm that will erase your trail completely,” Hrefna offered. “She and I would have to work on it all night, mind you, but I’d be willing, if you could part with some of your family’s treasure…”

Ubbe stopped his hand from going to his belt pouch, seeking Mikala’s silent counsel first. Her brows lifted: _can we trust her?_ Hrefna and his mother were not close, sometimes even acted like competitors, but her reputation in the community had always been good, and as far as he knew she bore his family no real ill-will. They should be able to trust her word, and her _seidr._ Ubbe nodded to Mikala.

His mysterious companion was not instantly convinced. She pressed her lips together in thought, examining the herbs hanging from the rafters and absently playing with Djalo’s hair.

“You did say that he already knows your tricks,” Ubbe reminded her.

Mikala let out a forceful exhale and met his eyes again. “I have nothing to pay her with. If you do this I will be too much in your debt.”

Ubbe shook his head. “It will protect me, and Mother, just as well. There is no debt.” He turned back to Hrefna, fishing a little brooch out of his belt-pouch. “This is not from my father’s hoard,” he explained, holding it up so that the golden metal glimmered in reflected firelight, “but part of my own spoils from the English kings.” It was smaller than his palm, and bore no stones, but the gold was pure and the flowing lines of its design were quite lovely.

Hrefna’s greed showed in her gleaming teeth, bared to the firelight. She still tried to dither. “I suppose such a tiny trinket might be worth my time.” She held up her palm. “Let me feel its weight.”

Mikala reached out and stopped him from complying. “What is the charm?” she asked first.

“We shall weave a net, wide and weighted,” Hrefna explained. “Imbued with my best _seidr._ And yours, if you know the working of it. When you leave tomorrow, you drag this net behind you, and it will erase all sign of your trail from the snow.”

Ubbe’s brows climbed. That was an incredibly useful magic. Why had he never heard of such a thing before?

“Such a tool would be a great blessing,” Mikala acknowledged, releasing Ubbe’s arm. “I will assist you in making this, however you need. Though I am not sure there is any useful power for charms in my own fingers.”

 

Ubbe stirred at the sharp popping sound of a fresh log in the hearth. His right hand clutched at his sword lying on the floor alongside the pile of Hrefna’s spare blankets that he dozed upon. With his left he patted Djalo, who lay curled against his chest. His tiny body had that dead weight that only sleeping children seemed to get. Ubbe’s drowsy eyes slitted open just wide enough to see Hrefna stepping away from the replenished fire and resuming her seat beside Mikala. The loose weave of the pale yellow net was growing larger between them.

He released the sword. All was as it should be.

He lay his head back but found it hard to return to sleep. Ubbe thought again of the large, wild-eyed man from the market. Arawk, she had called him. He compared his impressions of the man to everything Mikala had said. He wondered how the spirit would change his body. Ubbe’s mind drew an image of claws bursting from the man’s hands, and he tried to plan how he would fight someone who would seek to tear his throat and belly, who may not fear the swing of his blade. Though he had trouble imagining any hide thick enough to turn aside steel. Perhaps a dragon’s.

It would be better if he could get his shield, before he had to face him. If that beast came in through that door tonight, Ubbe decided he’d be best served picking up one of the chairs, to force it to keep its distance.

The women murmured in soft conversation above his head. Surely he was in the thick of his own destiny now: a great foe to fight, a magical artifact being woven for him. They would use it to return to his mother undetected tomorrow, but how else could it aid him? He wondered how large they were going to make the net, and how many footsteps it could cover at once. Could he use it to conceal the movements of an entire warband? It was impossible to predict how long his mother and Mikala would be working their _seidr,_ nor what instructions the gods might give. He had to be ready to hold off the creature until they were prepared for their next move.

Hrefna was asking soft questions again. He couldn’t make out all of their words, but he could tell she was pressing Mikala for more details about her quest. “It is a spirit that can possess the mind and heart of a person,” Mikala answered. “Transforms their bodies, even.” So she was ready to be honest with the old woman. But this was nothing he hadn’t already heard. Ubbe listened with half an ear as his mind wound down to sleep again. “It gives them great strength, and the claws and jaws of a great beast. And a great hunger. A terrible hunger.” Mikala’s voice grew hushed. “The spirit’s cravings can only be sated by terrible deeds.”

Ubbe wondered what she had seen it do, to put that tone into her voice. And what fresh havoc might it wreak as it searched for Mikala, having caught her scent here today. Old Dag had been killed already, gruesomely. Ubbe remembered that the man had touched her in the market; was that why he had become the monster’s prey?

And what did it do with the old man’s organs?

Ubbe was the only one that knew what was really loose in Kattegat. He had a responsibility to try and do something about it, didn’t he? He should be angry with Mikala for bringing it here, but he could not find that emotion inside of him. There was only dismay that she did not trust him enough to confide all the details of her troubles in him. Well. He would press her for more information tomorrow, and make a plan to chase this monster from his home, if he and his men could not just kill it outright. He still had hope for that; they were not the simple hunters Mikala knew. They were Vikings, fearsome warriors, and they did not fear any beast.

 

Ubbe woke again, much later, to the coals in the hearth dim and banked for sleep. Mikala was settling down beside him. Good that she would get some sleep before their journey resumed at sunrise, he thought dreamily. Djalo made a soft, needy sound and rolled toward her as soon as her scent wafted over them both.

It was a good scent, sweet and warm. Ubbe wished he could draw closer to it too. “I’ll get up,” he said instead, voice thick with sleep as he tried to extricate himself from the blankets without waking Djalo further. The babe’s little head was already rooting for her breast.

Mikala reached across her son to lay a gentle palm on Ubbe’s arm. “Stay.” Her hand was cold but the soft wrap of her fingers over his bicep made his mind go blank. “Keep sleeping.”

Ubbe exhaled softly and lay back down, sliding his back almost to the wall to make room for her on their makeshift bed. He thought Mikala may have smiled at him in the dark before she withdrew her hand; then all focus was on Djalo as she settled him in to nurse.

He wanted to admire her tenderness as they lay so close together, watching the spill of her loosened hair as she curled herself around her son. He pulled the heaviest fur up to cover her shoulders, made sure it fell far enough behind her back to keep her warm. He imagined himself as a shield over them both. He liked the way that image made him feel.

He wanted this but he still felt like he was intruding. The casual intimacy was so sweet that it throbbed a little, too tender. Ubbe rolled to face the wall, and fell asleep not thinking about the knee that nestled softly against the back of his leg.


	5. discoveries

Mikala didn’t miss him. She _couldn’t_ miss him.

She had spent almost a year on the run now, and always alone. Just her and Djalo. There should be nothing strange at all about trekking through the crusted snow today, back to Aslaug’s cabin without the woman’s tall, nosy son leading her way. She had only known that stubborn fool for barely one turn of the moon. If Ubbe, son of Ragnar, wanted to throw his life away, it shouldn’t matter more than any of the other deaths that lay in Mikala’s trail.

 _This way I can draw him away_ , he had said. _You go to Mother and get your answers_. He had made up his mind before she had even awoken this morning, already up off their pallet and sharpening his blade. His four feet of steel made a terrible noise against the whetstone. And he refused to believe her when she told him it wouldn’t be enough.

She was surprised by how strongly she felt the impulse to go after him, when Ubbe strode out of Hrefna’s house before Mikala was even fully dressed. There was no real comfort in knowing he planned to first gather up a few more men before he went hunting Arawk. Even now, halfway to the cottage, magic net wiping away her footprints just as promised, guilt snagged at her steps as she thought of the fate she was leaving Ubbe to. But Mikala could not turn around. Her moral imperative was clear: she could not put anything above Djalo’s safety. She could not bring the boy near Arawk again.

She was grateful for all the help Ubbe had provided her. Even appreciated the company, after so much time alone. But she didn’t deserve it. Just like she didn’t deserve to have anyone else dying over her. But Djalo… only Djalo mattered. Ubbe was doing it for him too, and that made the guilt tolerable.

She had been delighted to see how much Ubbe enjoyed her child. He usually seemed more interested in the boy than in her, and that big heart was the only reason she had even allowed him to get so close in the first place. If Ubbe was risking his life for Djalo today, then that was the best reason she had for continuing on without him, and getting the answers that she had come here seeking.

She gathered her nerves as Aslaug’s cottage came into sight. The more she had gotten to know the woman, the more intimidating she became. For most shamans, it was the opposite. It was one of the reasons that Mikala felt so hopeful about her upcoming vision quest, or whatever it was that these Vikings called it. True power clearly resided in that woman. Perhaps Mikala had finally found someone who could tell her what to do.

Her optimism did not, however, make it easy for her to step through that door. She had all the items Aslaug had requested from the market, but she was no longer in the company of the woman’s son, and she was going to have to answer for that. Several lies flitted through her consciousness, excuses for Ubbe’s absence that would buy her a little more time in the woman’s good graces, maybe until the ritual was complete and she didn’t need Aslaug’s favor anymore. But she settled on telling the truth, facing the old queen’s fear and blame now rather than later, when it would be worse.

Mikala felt crushed under the weight of the lies she had been forced to tell already. She had been an honest person once. And if she wasn’t trying to be that woman again, then what was even the point of all this?

 

* * *

 

Ubbe crunched through the crusted snow as he strode back toward Kattegat by a different route than the way they had come to Hrefna’s cottage last evening. He had tried to remove every speck of that red grit from inside his boots before he left, but he still had to pause and shake loose some grinding little irritant every few minutes. He wondered if that meant his trail was still being disguised by Mikala’s magic. He doubted it, but it didn’t really matter. He wanted Arawk to find him today.

He jumped as he heard a few branches vigorously rustle off to his left. Just a squirrel. He forced his hand away from the hilt of his sword. It would still be better if they did not meet until _after_ he had rounded up his men.

His mind flitted to the other fear he was trying not to think on. Hrefna had stopped him outside her cabin, out of Mikala’s earshot, just to warn him. _Be wary of what that girl is caught up in,_ she had hissed at him, laying a grandmotherly hand against his sword arm. _You’d better get her on her way quick as you can. She's a sweet girl, I see why you are drawn to her, but you don’t need her kind of trouble._

Ubbe had been so offended that he had brushed her off, irritated that both women wanted to keep him from what was obviously his quest. Now he was wishing he had questioned the old spae-wife further. What did she know that he didn’t? What else had the two of them talked of while he slept?

He tried to picture Mikala as a threat. But no matter how terrible the beast following her might turn out to be, he could not harden his heart toward her just for bringing it. When he thought of her face it was only to picture her wide mouth, which seemed made for smiling, though she only did so rarely. When he could get her deep brown eyes to sparkle in mirth, it was as if the whole earth twinkled in joy around her. It did not matter that those eyes were often haunted, her lips drawn and stern. That sadness was not really her, he could see that. And once he killed the beast that pursued her and Djalo, he could wipe all the worries from her lustrous brow.

 

* * *

 

“Where is my son?”

Mikala took a deep breath. “Your dream was accurate. The creature is already here, and Ubbe went to face it, to keep it away from us.” She may have decided upon honesty, but she still found herself shying away from Aslaug as she entered the cottage, avoiding looking the taller woman in the eye as she delivered the news. 

She had expected a barrage of questions, angry accusations, but Aslaug was silent as Mikala crouched down and began shedding her snow-encrusted boots. She peeked up at the matriarch to see her standing still in the doorway, looking solemnly out at the white woods with her arms crossed tight over her chest. “This is not like him,” she finally said, voice strangely soft. “Ubbe has always been one to find any excuse not to act. What have you done to my boy?” She turned her queenly gaze squarely upon Mikala, waiting for an answer as the girl rose to stand on stockinged feet.

“It is not me.” She shook her head quickly, warding off implications of either love or witchcraft. “I believe he does it to protect Djalo.” Mikala found herself wishing the child would rouse and interrupt them with some cranky demand, as he so often did. But this time his body remained still in sleep upon her back.

Aslaug sniffed, and nodded her head. “Ubbe had to be the man in our house, for so many years while my husband was absent.” She turned to regard the winter landscape again. “If there was one thing that was clear to my eldest growing up, it was that he had to protect the little ones.”

“He has a good heart,” Mikala said softly. She no longer found it easy to trust anyone, but Ubbe wore his intentions plain on his face, and she had never detected any hint of deception, and neither cruelty nor callousness. In that way he was very much like—Mikala forced herself not to complete that thought.

“Well then.” Aslaug pushed the door shut against the chill air. “If my son is risking himself to give us time, we had best use it.”

 

* * *

 

Try as he might, there were some thoughts Ubbe could not seem to keep himself from following as he made his way to Beinir’s house on the far side of town. It was easier to think of his foe as a monster, but Mikala had said that he was once a man. Who was this Arawk, and, more troubling, who was he to Mikala? There were some conclusions it was hard to avoid drawing, when a man was pursuing a woman. Particularly if he was after that woman’s child.

Mikala had been so intent upon evading the beast, once they knew he was here, that there had been no polite chance for Ubbe to pry. If they had been walking home together he would have gotten it out of her today, but now Ubbe was left trying not to jump to too many conclusions on too little information. Because if certain things were true, he might be a fool whether he succeeded or failed today.

The streets of Kattegat seemed busier than usual this morning. Many men and women stood in tight knots on the streets, wrapping cloaks snug as they exchanged words in the brisk winter air. It was warm for the season; they’d be in for a bit of a thaw if the bright sun held. Perhaps that was why so many people were out. But Ubbe was too burdened by his own thoughts to slow his feet and gossip with anyone he saw.

All he knew for certain was that Mikala was not married to that beast. Although, did he know that? For certain? She did not even consider the thing following her to be a man any longer, she had made that clear. So when she had insisted that the brute Ubbe met in the market was not her husband, she may have only been saying that he was not himself, that she did not recognize his soul any longer.

Ubbe stopped for only a moment to buy some fresh bread off a hawker in the market square as he passed through, enticed by the bits of dried fruit embedded in the golden crust. His mother’s bread was basic, a simple recipe for someone with little experience keeping a home herself. If he achieved his aim today, he would face a difficult combat. Best to do it on a full stomach.

He had told Mikala he was intending to kill the beast when he found him. She had not told him that he shouldn’t, only that she did not believe that he could. He was not certain what conclusion he was supposed to draw from that. Ubbe felt like he might be in love with Mikala. But what if he was about to kill this poor woman’s husband? Djalo’s father? The thought made his belly ache. But then why had she not forbidden him to kill the man?

It was also possible that Arawk was indeed Djalo’s father, but that Mikala had never loved him, had wanted to escape from him regardless. That sort of thing happened all the time. Mikala had never said how Arawk had become cursed. Perhaps he was a bad man before this spirit had come to inhabit him, too.

Ubbe shook his head against his swirling thoughts. No way to find out, now. Best to focus on the task ahead of him. There was a monster in Kattegat, and he was going to protect his people.

Beinir was sitting outside his home when Ubbe came upon him, sharpening his blades like he already knew to be ready for violence. “You left us very suddenly last night,” he said as he peered up at his old friend, in lieu of greeting. Beinir always did like to get right to the point. “I didn’t think that Northern girl was your type. Done with Margrethe, are you? She was upset.”

Ubbe swayed on his feet, an odd expression tugging at his face. He had planned to lay out the threat to Beinir matter-of-factly, without involving Mikala much. Instead, his motives were being questioned right at the outset. “Margrethe… has grown tiresome.” His shrug came out as an odd twisting of his shoulders. “And Mikala is a friend. She has business with my mother.” Ubbe dropped to a crouch beside Beinir, capturing his eyes. “She knew what killed Dag. A monster has followed her to Kattegat.”

Beinir only flicked his eyebrows. An outsider might think that the man was never afraid of anything. But Ubbe knew from their lifetime together that Beinir channeled any apprehension he felt into wry excitement. “A monster, you say? Something fit for a saga, perhaps?” His eyes narrowed just a little. “A worthy adversary for a son of Ragnar trying to make his own name.”

Ubbe leaned back on his heels, worried that his friend did not believe him.

Beinir turned his attention back to his sharpening. “It would fit what they found up at Oleif Tofisson’s homestead yesterday.”

Ubbe rocked forward, waiting for Beinir to continue.

“I heard the news this morning when Bolverk the potter came by to pick up his boots from my Da.” Beinir lived in this small house at the edge of town with his widowed father, who was too old now for battle but still made his living as a cobbler. “The whole family was slaughtered. Messy. Looked like an angry mother bear had gotten in there. But the house was locked up tight. Not something a wild animal could do, could it, excuse itself and close up the doors when it was done gnawing on the family.” He breathed out audibly, letting his words sink in. “Does that sound like your monster?”

Ubbe felt a chill in his spine as he imagined the scene, picturing the shambling man from the market stretching out an impossibly-long jaw and sinking fangs into a farmer’s wife. “From what I’ve been told, yes, that is something he could do.”

Beinir grunted. “No one knows quite what to think about it,” he said, wiping the keen edge of his axe before setting down the whetstone and standing tall. “Everyone’s got a different idea. What it was, what to do. Whether it had anything to do with what happened to old Dag. And no word yet from our brave, shieldmaiden queen, of course.”

Ubbe twisted his lip. Always, it came back to Lagertha. He gestured to the pair of axes Beinir was settling into his belt. “You look like you’ve got a plan.”

Beinir grinned. “Me? Never. I was just about to go get Storalf and then come find you. And look, you already know more than anyone else about it. So where to, Prince Ubbe?”

He waved off the title. “Storalf. And any other warriors we can trust to watch our backs. We’re finding this thing, and killing it. Today.”

 

* * *

 

She hated how strong she felt. Not just in her body but in her mind. Thoughts connected more quickly, and a deep confidence ran beneath even her very real fears. Mikala felt more fully herself today than she had in weeks.

It should be the opposite, if there were any justice in this world.

She followed Aslaug through the snow, staring at the gorgeous red fox pelt trimming the woman’s heavy cloak. It was a perfect complement to her copper hair, making her seem resplendent in her own natural power as they headed out to a grove Aslaug said was sacred to her gods.  A potent place to try and communicate with them.

Every creaking branch and clump of snow falling out of the surrounding trees plucked at Mikala’s ears. They were still using the enchanted net to cover their trail; Aslaug had pressed her lips together as she inspected Hrefna’s work, but she did not cast any doubts upon its effectiveness. There should be no reason to worry that Arawk would come upon them here. Still, Mikala could not keep her attention from being pulled by every new sound.

She let her mind turn to Ubbe, the one who was venturing much closer to danger today. Perhaps Arawk would not bother himself with him; perhaps Ubbe would not be able to find him. He may yet be safe. The thought made her heart leap higher than she wanted it to.

Was it a blessing or a curse that she had not had to fear being so close to Ubbe last night? Everything in her life was like that these days; mixed, tainted. She wasn’t sure yet if she regretted letting her knee come to rest against the taut back of his thigh, pretending it meant nothing to her to lay down beneath warm blankets beside the man. She hadn’t let their feet touch, of course, though the fleeting thought of it did make her breath catch. The last thing she needed was another lover. Too many of her troubles could trace back to letting someone into her bed.

Aslaug did not need much help when they arrived at the grove. Mikala stayed near the edge of the trees, patting and singing to Djalo as she nursed him, while Aslaug prepared to enter her sacred trance. They had given the boy a draught that was supposed to put him to sleep. Too much of it was a poison, but they had little other choice to keep him out of the way for this important work.

The herbs Aslaug burned smelled sweet and cloying. She warned her not to breathe too deep; Mikala was to inhale a small amount only, so she could keep her wits enough about her to be able to question whatever otherworldly being came to speak through Aslaug. And so that she would be able to remember the answers; the other woman likely would not.

Aslaug knelt at the center of the grove. Her pale eyes were smudged all around with a dark pigment. When they began to lose focus as the smoke took effect, they didn’t look glassy. They looked deeper, stronger; as if they were seeing into another realm. Her strange gaze swept toward Mikala and the girl stepped away, suddenly certain those eyes would see too much if they fell fully upon her. She took the bowl of burning herbs and wafted the smoke over Aslaug’s back, surrounding and purifying her as instructed.

When she stepped around to the front again, Aslaug’s eyes had closed. She had started humming, a deep noise in the back of her throat, which turned into a soft and rapid chant in words that Mikala could not understand. From the way the syllables repeated, it seemed a short incantation, perhaps a command or plea in a language only spirits knew.

Aslaug’s chanting stayed steady, only slowly rising in volume. Mikala set the bowl before her lap and then crouched down a few feet away, watching her sway. Djalo slept in a cradle hung a few more paces away amongst the branches. Mikala glanced at him often. She always felt the strangest mixture of peace and sadness when he was asleep but not in her arms.

The chanting stopped. Mikala whipped her head back just in time to see Aslaug’s eyes snap open. She held them so wide as to be almost perfectly round, the darkened rims enhancing the otherworldly effect. Her gaze was so hard Mikala knew in an instant it was no longer the former queen looking out of them.

 

* * *

 

Ubbe told Beinir everything he knew as they made their way to Storalf’s home, then repeated it again when they got there.

“He sounds like a berserker,” Storalf suggested. “Impossibly strong and ferocious as a mad dog? They say they are impervious to iron and fire too.”

Ubbe looked at him, pondering the idea. “The wolfskins that came with the Great Army seemed like rational men when I met them.”

Beinir barked a laugh. “You didn’t see them when we sacked York then.”

Ubbe shuddered, and Beinir gave him an apologetic nod for having brought up the subject. What Ivar did, what they all did in that town did not weigh on Beinir’s conscience the same way it did on Ubbe’s. Though he did not look down on him for it. These two had remained as Ubbe’s faithful companions precisely because they valued the morality of his heart. Battle can require one to be savage, but cruelty to innocents was something else. “But did you see them grow claws, and fangs, Beinir?”

“Perhaps your Mikala was exaggerating that part?” He shrugged as he said it.

Ubbe just shook his head. He had decided to believe her completely. “But it could be something similar. We might learn from the comparison. Do they have a weakness?”

“Berserkers are as weak as children when their battle rage passes,” Storalf said, “and soon fall into a stupor so deep they will sleep amongst the corpses if no one gets them back to camp.”

Ubbe pressed his lips together. “So if we survive a fight with him long enough to wear him down, he may be easier to kill in his sleep? I am not sure if that helps us.”

“I spent some time drinking with the wolfskins, while the army was traveling,” Beinir volunteered. “I got a few secrets out of them.” He paused and grinned, ever dramatic. “We don’t know what this Arawk is, but if he is like a berserker, perhaps we have a way to match him in power? One of the brothers lost a bet to me, you see, and gave me a bag of their berserker secret.”

Ubbe felt his eyebrows climbing up to his hairline. “And you didn’t come back to brag about that to us right away?”

Beinir’s answering grin was sheepish. “They swore me to secrecy. In fact, they warned me never to even try one myself. But a bet was a bet, and that’s what I had asked for.”

“What is it?” Storalf said impatiently.

“Some kind of mushroom,” Beinir replied. “Shriveled little grey things. Not sure if they’re anything that I’ve seen growing around the forest before.”

“Probably not, if they’re magic,” Storalf grunted. “I wonder why they warned you not to eat them.”

“One likely needs training to manage the battle fury,” Ubbe said, looking up at the sky, worrying about Mikala again already. Had she reached Mother yet? Was Arawk already figuring out where to find her? Where would he go next?

That part, at least, Mikala had told him. “We should be going. We’ll know more when we get close.”

 

* * *

 

“Great One,” Mikala started, bowing her head in respect to the visitor from the spirit realm. “You have my humble thanks, for answering our cry for help.”

Aslaug’s strange wide eyes stared at her, unblinking. “You have questions,” it stated. The voice was Aslaug’s, but the tone was unfamiliar, and the syllables stretched out just a little too long.

Mikala refused the nerves that tried to flutter around her heart. Compared to all the uncanny things she had seen shamans do, Aslaug’s act was quite subtle. That actually made it seem more real. But she would keep herself skeptical until she found some greater proof that a spirit, a helpful one, was really here. “I come to you with but one question,” Mikala said smoothly, with all the humility she could muster into her voice. “What must be done to lift this curse?”

“Of what curse do you speak?”

Mikala’s exhale was soft and thin. “You cannot see what ill spirit is dogging my heels?”

The thing inhabiting Aslaug smiled, or tried to. The muscles in her cheeks jumped and dragged her lips off shiny teeth. “We know him, that one,” it hissed. “But, it was you that welcomed him in. Why have you changed your mind?”

Mikala sucked her breath in through her teeth. If the spirit knew that, there was no fraud here. She was speaking to the real thing. It took her a moment to collect herself enough to answer. “I-it is evil, what it does.”

Aslaug’s eyes twitched in their wide sockets. “You have a limited view of morality. What is evil to you is simply the nature of one spirit or another.”

Mikala got the feeling she had offended it. Or worse, that this one was kin to whatever it was that Arawk had brought into her life. She tried to speak carefully. “Whatever you call it, it is a threat to my kind. I wish to stop the spilling of the blood of the People. I will not be a party to that any more.”

“And what of the power?” The rider leaned Aslaug closer. “That is what you traded blood for. And why it continues to be spilled.”

Mikala shook her head, feeling how heavy her heart lay in her chest. “I was wrong to want that power,” she confessed. “The vengeance was not worth the price.”

“Are you certain? We saw you revel in it.” It was hard to keep looking in its horrid eyes, their inhuman wildness only enhanced by the dark smudges of kohl rimming both of Aslaug’s lids.

“No longer,” Mikala said firmly, forcing herself not to back down. “I do not ask this for myself. I no longer want anything in this world, except for my son to have a normal life among the People. This is about Djalo. He does not deserve to bear his father’s curse.”

A dry sound, almost a cough, rattled out of Aslaug’s throat. It took Mikala a moment realize that the spirit was laughing at her. Then the old queen froze, mouth hanging open. Her next words croaked, heavy with import. “Bring him to the dead.”

The dead? There were so many dead in Mikala and Arawk’s trail. Aslaug’s eyes lost focus, then closed.

“Wait!” Mikala cried. “Bring who? Which dead?”

Aslaug’s lips twitched, the rest of her face going slack. “They are eager to speak with you.”

 

* * *

 

To Ubbe’s eyes, the traders’ camp looked almost the same as it had yesterday. In the blueish light of the fading sun, the four huts built of snow looked just like little hills, only each was interrupted with one dim, yawning mouth for an entryway. It was perhaps a bit more untidy than the last time he’d been here; tools and cooking utensils were lying about the central area between the homes, and the snow was muddied and brown near the stacked sledges and piles of supplies.

On both of Ubbe’s previous visits, the dogs had been the first to notice the arrival of newcomers, rushing from the mouths of the houses to bark furiously at them. This time, the camp remained silent.

Ubbe put a hand out beside him, palm down, cautioning his companions to be wary.

The crunch of snow under his boots felt unreasonably loud as Ubbe stepped into the open space between the four huts. He had hoped Arawk had questioned the traders and then left quietly, following Mikala’s false trail. The other possibility seemed more likely now, and he prepared himself to find evidence of a more violent end.

The snow was packed more tightly in the central area, and his steps made less noise. A soft whining emerged from the right-most tunneled entryway. Ubbe flinched. It was the cry of a dog, sounding so nervous it feared to make even so small a noise. He stopped a little more than arm’s-reach from the dim opening and crouched down, making sure one palm faced forward even as his other hand settled on his axe.

As his head came low enough to see under the lip of the entry tunnel, Ubbe spotted several furry bodies, mottled white and black, moving in the darkness there. The whining increased, but the dogs neither approached nor threatened him. The tunnel sloped and he couldn’t see if there were any people behind them, but there was no light inside.

He stood, setting his jaw and drawing the axe from his belt. It wasn’t as deadly as his sword but it was weighted for throwing, and he wasn’t certain what to expect next.

Storalf stepped close to him. “They all left?” he suggested, looking around the motionless camp.

Ubbe brought his mouth near the man’s ear so he could speak softly. “The dogs are still here. And they’re frightened.” He gestured toward the other dwellings. “Use caution.”

Storalf peeled off to peer inside the next tunnel; Beinir made for the left-most house, which left the one beside the sledges for Ubbe. As he passed them he noted that one sled looked halfway loaded, stacked with furs and skins.

This one was Mikala’s friend Nuneta’s home. No leashed dogs streamed out at him this time.

He sank to his knees in front of the entryway. A warm light flickered inside, but the tunnel sloped downward and Ubbe did not have a line of sight into the main room of the dwelling.

He almost called Nuneta’s name, but when he took a breath of the air inside that dwelling all sound died on his tongue. It was unexpectedly humid in there, warm and a bit sour, with the unmistakable scent of blood filling his nostrils. It smelled like someone had butchered several large animals in this tiny space, and recently. While Ubbe did not know how Mikala’s people habitually dressed their game, his mind flashed again to the state of the farmer’s cottage and he squeezed his hand around the haft of his axe. If his unannounced entrance was about to startle a woman working in the peace of her own home, that was the least of his worries.

He crawled as silently as he could down the soft slope of hard-packed snow. Perhaps it was his own apprehension, but the orange light seemed to be flickering strangely against the icy walls of the tunnel. He could hear movement in there now, some kind of bustling and dragging that was probably hiding the sound of his own low crawl, hand over axe over hand. Probably.

The tunnel wasn’t long, perhaps six feet. The icy blocks forming the ceiling were too low for him to stand, but high enough that Ubbe could approach on hands and knees and not on his belly. He could see now that there were two wide steps at the end of the tunnel, raising the main floor of the dwelling. This blocked his view, but also hid his approach from whoever was inside.

He dropped down to his belly when he reached the first step. A shadow on the ceiling told him there was someone moving in front of the source of the orange light, which did not smell like woodsmoke, but the unfamiliar slope of the frozen blocks made it hard for Ubbe to tell exactly where in the room the person was. He paused and listened to the sound of snapping gristle and smacking lips.

 

* * *

 

When Aslaug collapsed, Mikala had left her where she fell. She had a true answer, that much was clear, but the instructions were difficult to interpret. Would the dead really be able to cure her son? Or was “him” Arawk, the one who brought the curse into her life in the first place? They could even have meant the spirit that infected them. Djalo started fussing before the old queen awoke from her trance, and Mikala welcomed the soft comfort of pulling her boy into her arms. She loosened the neck of her parka and slid her groggy son inside its warmth. It was a good sign that he had awoken so quickly, she thought. They had not given him too much of the sleeping herb.

Aslaug made a low sound as she awoke too, pulling her furs tightly around herself as she shifted to a seated position. “Did we succeed?” She spit on the ground and scowled. “Tastes like something came into me.”

“Yes,” Mikala answered, resting in a crouch before her. “It gave me instructions that I believe I can trust. Thank you, Shaman, truly, for sharing your power.”

Aslaug’s smile was imperious even through her exhaustion. “We say _völva_ here. But you are welcome. You have the answers you seek?”

Mikala’s brow creased. “It is difficult to interpret the meaning. The spirit simply said ‘bring him to the dead.’”

Aslaug’s lips pressed into a small, satisfied smile. “So you must lead your beast away from us. Away from Kattegat, and my son.” Her pointed look was barely necessary to convey her meaning. “Though what is meant by ‘the dead’ may be harder to discover.”

“That part, I believe I understand.”

Aslaug waited for her to elaborate, but Mikala remained silent. The queen huffed softly. “Your secrets are yours to keep, of course. But now that you have your answer, can you do something to stop my son from getting himself killed today?”


	6. showdown

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There's a horror-related trigger in this chapter, check the tags if you need to be warned, and don't check the tags if you don't want to be spoiled!

Ubbe held his breath as he raised his head high enough to see into the main room of the dwelling. The domed walls were lined with skins, warmly lit by a stone bowl of oil with a long, brightly-burning wick. The flame flickered near a large raised bed that dominated the back wall. Two people were on that bed, and Nuneta’s lifeless eyes stared vaguely toward the lamp she would never tend again.

Though he could only see the shaggy skins covering the back of the man who sat next to her, Ubbe recognized him instantly from the market. Arawk was there, and he had turned the dwellers of this hut into meat. Out of the corners of his eyes Ubbe could see other bodies lying red and ragged on both sides of the room.

Ubbe’s very bones felt chilled; he could not move as he watched Arawk reach a grotesquely elongated hand across Nuneta’s rent belly, using curved claws to carve something purplish and glistening from beneath her ribs. He brought it to his mouth, turning to reveal the profile of a face just as human as the one Ubbe had met in the market the day before. He chewed like any man indulging in a feast, leaning back comfortably on his arm and letting a line of red dribble down his chin.

The shift in position led Arawk’s line of sight directly to Ubbe’s face peering out of the entrance tunnel in the floor. The Viking had been too shocked to withdraw. Arawk’s lips pulled back in a snarl, revealing bloody fangs swiftly growing longer than any human teeth. Ubbe’s arm reacted on instinct, roaring to life and hurling the axe from his hand directly toward the creature’s face.

He hauled himself back out of that grisly chamber without even watching to see how his weapon landed. He shouted something to warn Beinir and Storalf; in his terror he wasn’t even sure it if was in words. Mikala had left out the most horrifying detail of what Arawk was. Ubbe scrambled to his feet as soon as he saw sky, backing away from the entrance and drawing his sword.

Storalf was closer, and flanked him with a weapon in each hand. Ubbe had a moment to wish they hadn’t assumed they were just scouting, and had brought their heavy wooden shields. “It’s in there?” the stout man asked.

“He was—” Ubbe stopped trying to explain the worst part when the scrabbling sounds of the beast’s pursuit up the tunnel became obvious.

What emerged was no longer the face of a man. It looked like a skinned wolf, the hairless flesh of human skin reddish and strained to cover the snout full of gnashing teeth that was now stretching Arawk’s jaw.

Storalf cried out in horror and Ubbe stumbled back. The thing launched itself at Ubbe without even bothering to stand when its momentum cleared the tunnel, one giant clawed hand coming for his throat.

Tyr must have been guiding Ubbe’s arm. His sword came up to deflect the beast’s momentum, slicing along where arm met chest and giving Ubbe just enough room not be knocked over by the lunge.

Storalf recovered his wits quickly too, burying his axe in the middle of the thing’s back as it passed. But Arawk’s hides must have been thick, because it turned and recovered its footing without any sign of damage.

The thing that had been Arawk had grown larger, towering certainly more than seven feet as it faced them down. “You again,” it said as it peered down at Ubbe. Was his voice the same, or was it deeper in this form? “I knew you were lying to me. Tell me where she is, and maybe I won’t start sucking your flesh from your bones while you’re still alive.” His terrible claw came rending down to grab Ubbe by the shoulder.

Beinir’s shrieking battle cry sounded from behind the monster’s back, and the impact of his sword in the flank just below Arawk’s grasping arm shook them both and allowed Ubbe to twist free. The beast made an angry sound and grabbed at the offending weapon, yanking the blade to pull Beinir closer as it rounded on him.

The creature acted invulnerable, but drops of red flicked off the hand that had grasped Beinir’s naked sword. ~~~~

Claws screeched across Beinir’s helmet; it may have protected his face but the metal dome spun and momentarily blinded him. The beast’s next blow must have found purchase somewhere else, because Ubbe heard his friend groan in pain. He roared as he lifted his sword, aiming for the neck and ready to use all his strength to strike Arawk’s head from his body.

 

* * *

 

She smelled blood on the wind before she could see the camp, heard the shouts of fighting men and Arawk’s unmistakable roar. Was she too late already? Regardless of Ubbe’s boasting, she could not imagine him surviving Arawk’s rage for long.

Mikala came out of the trees to see three fully-armed Vikings surrounding Arawk, who was wearing his most terrible form. Though he towered over them, five claws on each hand as long and sharp as knives, she could see from the way he snapped and jerked that the men were holding their own against him. Frustrating him, even. She hunkered down into a spot downwind as she decided how best to intervene.

 

* * *

 

Beinir was limping, though he kept his weapons up and harried the beast, forcing it to keep turning and protecting its flanks. They had all taken scratches and punctures by now, but Beinir’s blood was starting to seep all the way to the snow from his rent thigh. He caught Ubbe’s eye when he could, fumbling with something at his belt.

“I’m trying the mushroom,” he shouted. _I can’t keep up much longer,_ his eyes explained.

Ubbe lost track of what his friend was doing when the monster pushed Storalf to the ground and came at Ubbe with a snarl, jaw split wide to seek his throat.

 

* * *

 

Mikala’s chest was tight with worry for Ubbe, but at least seeing Arawk right before her eyes let her know that Djalo was safe for now, back at Aslaug’s cabin. Whenever she made her move, she wouldn’t be putting her son in immediate danger.

Ubbe’s hacking sword arm looked as deadly as Arawk’s claws. Her decision to abhor violence forgotten for the moment, Mikala thought Ubbe had never looked more magnificent than he did now as he stalked around the beast, weight centered and eyes grimly focused on his deadly intent.

The wind shifted.

 

* * *

 

“Mikala,” roared the monster, lunging to its full height and pushing back Ubbe’s sword like he was a child. “At last, my long-lost bitch shows herself. Where is my son?”

Ubbe fell back into a defensive stance as his eyes followed Arawk’s to the treeline. What was she doing here? Mikala had never looked smaller to him than she did at that moment, stepping out into view with her empty arms up. And yet, her face was ferocious. She looked ready to fight the monster herself, to defend Djalo who she must have hidden somewhere, and Ubbe’s heart plummeted even deeper into love at that moment.

Frothing at the mouth, Beinir suddenly screamed back into the battle, raining a frenzy of blows onto the distracted Arawk. It seemed the mushroom had indeed made him berserk. The beast struck back and they tangled, Beinir’s frenzied face right in Arawk’s bestial one.

Mikala cried something that Ubbe couldn’t catch as he and Storalf ranged close with weapons raised, watching for any opening to strike without hitting their companion.

Landing a good blow across Beinir’s jaw, Arawk flung him away. The smaller man rolled twice before coming back to his feet, cackling madly and drawing two new knives from his belt. Storalf charged for a combined attack, and at that moment the mushroom turned on his friend. Ubbe saw Beinir bend at the waist abruptly, as if he had been struck, and vomit a frothy stream two full feet out in front of himself before falling to his knees.

“Ubbe, now!” Storalf called out. The beast was on top of him, but Storalf had momentarily caught both his arms.

Ubbe’s blade swung high, lined up to sever the beast’s neck. “Ubbe, no!” called Mikala’s voice, and though his sword was already falling heavy and true, he obeyed her without thinking. He pulled his strike to the side, and the sickening crunch of gristle came from shoulder rather than spine.

The beast screamed and tore loose from Storalf, heaving his great chest one way, then the other. His arm remained in the Viking’s grip when the rest of him jumped free. Arawk whirled to face Ubbe down, then froze as his monstrous hand strayed to check the socket where his other limb should be.

Ubbe raised his sword, marching grimly toward his foe even as the back of his brain tried to process why Mikala would have stopped his killing blow.

The monster bared his teeth, then whirled and ran straight for the trees, his giant tracks punctuated by great bright splotches of arterial blood.

 

* * *

 

A feral kind of joy rose in Mikala’s chest when she saw that Ubbe had actually severed Arawk’s arm. There had been a time that she had believed him to be completely invulnerable. He had later taken wounds in their time together, but still she had thought him too tough to ever be maimed. There really was hope, then, that his life could be ended. Once she was certain she did not need him to save Djalo first.

“After him!” the man standing next to Ubbe urged, feet already taking flight.

Ubbe stayed him with a hand on his shoulder. “That’s a mortal wound,” he countered, pointing at the bright red decorating his trail. “There is no need to rush.” His fierce eyes, still battle-frenzied, fell on Mikala, his mouth opening like he was about to speak. He hesitated, then closed it without making a sound, turning to the man lying on his face in the snow. “First we check Beinir.”

Mikala could not detect Arawk slowing at all in his flight through the trees. Off somewhere to lick his wounds, then. She came down into the camp with soft steps as the Vikings bent over their fallen companion. He groaned when the men rolled him onto his back, and the ground beneath his leg was as bloody as Arawk’s trail. Beinir’s face was pale and striped with pinkish vomit, but he managed to speak as his eyes focused on Ubbe’s face. “Does this mean we won?”

The other man grunted as he assessed the leg wound. “No one’s dead yet, but sometimes that’s victory enough.” He applied pressure and Beinir wheezed, but Storalf’s expression was reassuring when he looked back up at Ubbe. “It’s not as deep as it looks. I think we can bind it very tightly here, and he should be able to limp back to his bed once the sickness wears off.” He looked back down. “Stupid of you, to eat those things.”

“Worked though, didn’t it?” Beinir replied, then coughed like he might purge again at any moment.

The wind picked up, and Mikala felt the wilderness at her back in more ways than one. Ubbe had people here. He had men willing to die for him, and for what he thought was important. Looking at them smile at each other made her heart ache for what she herself had lost.

Mikala surveyed the devastated camp as Ubbe worked to save his friend’s life. She smelled blood in every direction. It was obvious Arawk had slaughtered everyone, and Mikala wanted to weep just at the awareness that she couldn’t even summon any horror over it. She had traveled with these families for several turns of the moon. Surely she should have felt something stronger over their deaths than this hollow resignment.

Her eyes fell on the sledges, her ears perking up at the sound of dogs still cowering in one of the snow houses. Nothing to do now but move on, and do her best to put an end to this nightmare.

“I still think we should go after that monster,” Storalf was saying to Ubbe when her steps carried her closer to the men huddled around their friend.

“He’ll die of that wound,” Ubbe countered, “without anyone out there to help him.”

“No, he will not,” Mikala said. “If he ran off it was because he knew he could heal it. Otherwise he would have preferred to die in battle, taking his enemies down with him. Arawk is shrewd, and he does not know fear.”

“He would not have been able to heal a severed head,” Ubbe growled, still crouched over his friend and refusing to look up at her. Then, even more cutting: “I suppose you are glad to know that you saved his life.”

“Your mother channeled the spirits for me, Ubbe,” Mikala retorted, “and they said I need him alive, to lift the curse.”

Ubbe’s jaw was still set. “So I risk my life, and those of my men, so that your lover can become human again.” He spat on the ground, and his companions stared sullenly up at her.

“I don’t care about Arawk,” she scoffed. “I am doing this for Djalo only.”

Ubbe finally lifted his eyes to her, and Mikala could barely withstand their baleful fire. “A boy needs his father, eh? I did just fine without mine.”

It was time to say it. If he turned against them now, she could just leave. “No, Ubbe, the cure. The cure is for Djalo.”

He was silent for a long moment, the expression draining out of his face. Mikala tried not to think of what others had wanted to do when they found out her boy bore this curse. “But he doesn’t…” Ubbe trailed off, voice growing softer. “He has never seemed…” He shook his head, looking back up at her with a surprising kindness. “Not everything about a father passes down to his children. Maybe he doesn’t have it?”

“He has it. Arawk made certain of that.” She shuddered, forcing herself not to remember her most shameful moment. “Djalo doesn’t know what it is that he craves yet, but he feels it, the poor boy.”

Ubbe looked stricken. He had grown to love her boy, and she had just ruined that.

“Djalo is with your mother right now. Don’t worry, she is perfectly safe. I have kept him as innocent as I can, and he is not yet the beast his father would have him become.”

Ubbe nodded, but his eyes were reddening.

Mikala pressed on, so she wouldn’t have to listen to his thoughts on the matter. “Some of the dogs are still here. I will load up a sled, and after I get Djalo I’ll head back north, where your mother’s guiding spirit told me to go. When Arawk recovers, he will start following me again. And then this will all be just a bad dream for you and your people.” She stepped away, toward the sledges, preparing to do just as she said.

Ubbe followed her. When she did not look to him, he cleared his throat and spoke anyway. She was surprised at the softness of his tone, when she had expected more harsh recriminations. “Take the net that Hrefna made me, so he cannot track you.”

Mikala sighed. “You would rather he follow the only trail he can find then, yours, and take his anger out on you and your mother?” She shook her head. “I will draw him away, I cannot leave you to that fate… Though truthfully, even if he has my trail he might come for you first. He is vengeful, and you have certainly hurt his pride today.”

“I do not fear to fight him again,” Ubbe said, his chin lifting.

“But if he finds you with your mother…”

Ubbe huffed, thinking hard. His eyes cast about the ruined camp, lingered on Mikala, and then landed on his friends. “Then we take the dogsled back to the cottage,” he announced. “All of us.” His eyes flitted between Storalf and Beinir. “My friends, I must ask of you one more task. Get Mother onto a boat and take her over the water to Ivar. She will be safer there.”

Storalf raised one thick brow. “You cannot take her yourself?”

“I am going with Mikala. We will finish this together, however it has to be done.”

 

* * *

 

Ubbe was a little surprised at his own choice, though he knew in his heart it was the right one. He would not walk the path of fear this time. Arawk did not look like the black wolf that Mother had described after all, but he still believed that he was being moved by his destiny.

Mikala had fallen silent as they took stock of the carnage in the camp. Ubbe tried to shield her from the horror inside Nuneta’s home, but Mikala seemed barely affected by it. With a grim cast to her jaw, she searched each room until she was certain everyone was found. Arawk had killed every single one of her people here.

Ubbe helped her drag the bodies into one hut, then gave her privacy as she began to sing over them, soft and low. He waited outside to console her when she emerged, but Mikala went straight to the sleds, carefully avoiding the compassion offered in his eyes. He felt her gathering up inside of herself, pulling away from him even though he had just pledged to stay by her side.

It was almost cold, the way she went through their belongings after that, sorting out the best of all their meager traveling supplies and laying them out next to a sledge. Wiping off the bloodstains and cannibalizing the lives of these people while their bodies were still warm. It felt ugly. Ubbe knew it had to be done, but he hated watching Mikala be the one to do it. “We need to take all of the skins out of one of the houses,” she instructed, “and under the bed are the tentpoles, for shelter in warmer weather.”

Ubbe moved to his left but she stopped him, indicated a different hut. “That one is less bloody,” she said softly. He felt a fine tremble in the hand that she placed upon his arm.

Something loosened in his chest. She felt it too, the ugliness. He laid his mitten over hers, fixed her with what he hoped was a comforting gaze. “One must take whatever it is that the Allfather provides, under circumstances like these.”

Mikala blinked, then nodded. “One day, I will no longer have to live like this. And hopefully now, with the answers your mother provided, that day is coming soon.”

 

* * *

 

Mikala was so relieved to have Djalo back in her arms again that she barely listened to the reunion between her hosts. Every time she had to leave him behind, it was hard to banish the suspicion that Arawk would somehow circle around her to get to the boy. Now she could think only of being on their way, and putting as much distance between her son and his father as she dared.

She almost growled at Ubbe when he reached for Djalo too, just as soon as he could extricate himself from his mother’s worried embrace. Aslaug wanted to dress the shallow wounds in his shoulder, but first he apparently needed to reassure himself that the boy was well, too.

Djalo smiled at Ubbe’s overtures of affection, but clung to Mikala and whined when he offered his arms. He burrowed for the opening to Mikala’s parka and she gave the well-meaning man an apologetic grimace. Spattered with Arawk’s blood, his smell was probably frightening the boy, but she would tell him that later.

 “We must leave at first light,” she said instead, stepping to Ubbe’s side even as Djalo began rooting for her breast. The boy had been nursing almost insatiably. She helped him find her nipple discreetly as discussion sparked.

“You’re going with her?” Aslaug said in surprise, eyes flitting between Mikala and her son, with a sour edge to both face and words.

Ubbe stood up straighter, edging closer to Mikala as he faced his mother squarely. “The monster is not dead. I will not abandon Mikala and her child to it.”

Aslaug’s darkened eyes narrowed. “So you abandon your family, and your home, instead.”

Ubbe’s body vibrated like he had been struck. Mikala knew that Aslaug hoped her son would take the throne back from she who had usurped it. But she wasn’t sure if the mother could see that her son’s heart was not in that task.

“I have no army,” he said, voice low as if he were dragging the words unwilling from out his throat. “I will not be the son that gives you your home back.”

Aslaug pressed her lips together, but did not speak to argue.

“I do fear that you will not be safe, if left alone here. I did not think to simply abandon you.” He took her hand between both of his as he laid out his plan. “While I did not bring back many loyal men from the Great Army, here are Beinir and Storalf, and there are a few more yet near Kattegat we can call upon. I will bid them to take you across the sea, to Ivar.”

Aslaug stepped away from Ubbe, eyes cast farther than the rough-hewn walls of the cottage. Her fists clenched in the wool of her shawl. “I am not going to Ivar.” There was so much there that she would not say. “I have been thinking too. About many things these past days, my son. And how the winds may change. If we are all to leave, then it is time to give these thoughts form.”

Ubbe tilted his head, brow furrowed.

“My own people are gone, but there is one household yet in this land whose intentions align with my own.” She turned back to face the rest of the room. “Call your men for me, Ubbe. They will make a fitting honor guard to escort me, to the court of King Harald. He is perhaps more likely to get me my vengeance than my own wayward sons.”


	7. monster

“Give him to me,” Ubbe had said. His voice was rich and warm, his eyes bright and patient. The same way he would have asked to hold Djalo on any other day.

Still, Mikala hesitated. It was hard to believe the knowing the truth about her boy didn’t change Ubbe’s feelings about him. Her fingers curled through Djalo’s hair as he fussed against her shoulder.

Ubbe glanced at the middle-aged couple sitting beside the hearth with them, their hosts for the evening. “He is done nursing, yes? I’ll get him to sleep. Give your arms a rest, Mikala; he hasn’t let you put him down all day.”

“He is having a hard time.” They all were, on the run again. In truth she wasn’t certain if it was Djalo or herself in need of the extra closeness; even putting him in the carrier behind her back felt too far away today.

Ubbe moved closer, held out steady hands. “Let me help you.”

The farmwife nudged her husband. “Do you remember when ours were little like that?” She turned a wide smile to Mikala. “A little advice, dearie. Let your man help. And be grateful he’s one that will. You can’t do it all alone, especially once a few more come along.”

A slight apology tweaked Ubbe’s smile as he waited for Mikala to decide. Of course everyone they met would assume that they were together. And so long as Ubbe did not try to take advantage of that, it seemed more trouble than it would be worth to correct the misconception.

They were both right. Djalo had just nursed. This would be a good time to let him out of her arms. And though he seemed unsatisfied now, he would settle. There was nothing more she could do for that other hunger. “Do you want to go to Ubbe, little one?” she crooned.

“Bé!” Djalo cried, head swiveling to find his favorite friend. Mikala watched the man’s hands for any stiffness, any fear as she passed the child off to him. Ubbe swooped him up and drew the boy right to his chest, flinching only when the movement aggravated the wound in his shoulder. He set Djalo to the other side and waved off Mikala’s offer to take him back.

“Is he a good eater, or is it still just the nursing?” the farmwife asked, her eyes following Ubbe’s tall form as he stepped softly around the cottage, convincing Djalo to settle with soft nonsense on his tongue. “He looks old enough to be eating real food.”

“He does,” Mikala replied. “There are so many unfamiliar flavors here in the South, but he tries everything.”

“That’s all you can ask, at that age.” The woman grunted, a soft, pleased noise. “He is good with him,” she said of Ubbe, nodding over Mikala’s shoulder. “Patient, unlike so many young men.”

Mikala smiled graciously, then turned to look at the pair. Djalo’s attention was on Ubbe’s wounded shoulder, his fingers winding under the edge of the bandages. In an instant, she was on her feet. “Ubbe!”

The fool looked up at her with only slight confusion creasing his brow. “What? He is curious. I won’t let him hurt it.”

“Ubbe.” She stalked over to them. There was no way to explain, with their hosts right there, what she feared Djalo was after. Did Ubbe not understand what it meant, that Djalo had the curse? They were only surviving as well as they had because she had kept the taste of blood out of his mouth.

It was something that had required much vigilance, and worry, and hard sacrifices along their journey. Ubbe’s intentions may have been good, but he had no idea what it had taken to separate Djalo from Arawk’s influence.

Mikala took her baby back and sat down with him on the bed they had been offered for the night. From the corner of her eye she could see Ubbe, standing awkwardly nearby, but she refused to look up. What could she say? She started playing finger games with Djalo to keep him amused, but her mind was elsewhere, flooded by memories of the things she had done to survive their travels amongst ignorant strangers.

 

* * * * *

 

She remembered how blissfully warm it had felt inside the earth-walled longhouse of the Peregrine People. Mikala had almost forgotten such simple joy by the time she found them; to be surrounded by chattering people, ochre skins, and burning lamps. Djalo had felt warmer in her arms too, warmer than he had been in a long while. She watched his face gratefully as he slept on her lap.

The Peregrine People lived all together in one village in the autumn season. The families slept in individual homes while the unmarried stayed in the clan longhouse, where everyone was now gathered. One of the old men was telling a story. “Once there was a man who lived far up the river, all alone with just his wife and two children. The man was a great hunter, who had often boasted he did not need his clan, or the help of any neighbors.”

Wide grins appeared on the faces of the young boys. They must have known what story was coming. Mikala listened with only one ear. It was said this storyteller was a wise man who knew much, but his slow way of speaking did not impress her.

“The man was proud to live in a place where game was scarce, and no other people could survive. He was said to talk to spirits, who told him where all the game could be found. The people of the clan tired of this boastful man, and when he moved his house far, far inland, they were glad to see him go. No one wanted to talk to him, and when winter came nobody ever checked on the man or his family.”

Djalo stirred in her arms, and she clutched him tighter.

“During that winter, this great hunter could find no food. Some say even his helping spirits had grown displeased with him. His wife begged him to go back to the village and ask for help. The proud man refused. He stubbornly went out with his spear every day, and returned home each time empty-handed. His children grew sad and hollow, and his wife screeched at him like a seabird every night.

“One day, the man’s wife decided to go back to the village herself, and beg for some food. She set out just after her husband left to hunt. So much fresh snow had fallen, however, that it was very difficult to travel, and she struggled on slowly.

“Out hunting, the man came up behind his wife as she pushed through a snow bank. No one knows what the man was thinking as he watched her. He said not a word, but after a moment he raised his spear and struck her with a mighty blow.”

Mikala realized that Djalo was awake, staring intently at the child sitting on the bench near them. She turned his head quickly to her breast, trying to get him to nurse.

“Did he do this out of rage, or confusion? We know not, but next the man did a very evil thing. He dragged his wife’s body home, and outside the lodge he butchered her like a deer. He brought the meat in to his children, and asked them to cook it for him.” The storyteller paused for effect, looking into the people’s eyes to make certain they were properly chilled by the evil deed. Mikala looked up from her son, attention finally snared.

“’Where is our mother?’ the children asked. ‘She left us to return to the village,’ the evil man answered. ‘She did not believe I would find us food, but look, here I have provided.’ And he bade his daughter prepare the meat and cook for the family now. They ate well and were satisfied that evening, and the meat lasted them several weeks. The man went out hunting with renewed strength, but it was as if the spirits were keeping the game away from him. Every trail he followed went cold.

“He came home and looked at his children with a terrible hunger behind his eyes. The man told his son to join him in hunting the next day, and his terrible hunger grew ever stronger. As he watched the boy walking ahead of him, the man looked down to see that his hands had become claws. With a great roar he fell upon his own son, tearing at his flesh and eating not as a man would, but as a bear or other great beast with its prey.” The storyteller swung his arms wide, miming a predator with its kill.

Mikala stared, afraid to hope.

“He gobbled up the boy until there were only bones. The man did not return home that night. He no longer needed shelter from the cold, for he had become an evil spirit, a creature of the winter with his heart turned to ice. He came back to his house to eat his daughter, and then there was nothing left there that he wanted.” He sat down beside the largest seal-oil lamp.

“What happened to the man?” Mikala asked, fearing this was the end of the story and he had no more to tell.

“He was still hungry,” the wise man said gravely. Then he chuckled to himself. “It is nice to have someone new to tell my tales to. You have not heard this one before?”

She shook her head. “I have heard similar things told, of men becoming evil spirits, but I do not know the story of this great hunter.”

“And a great hunter he remained,” the storyteller said, resuming the tale, “but he began to hunt men.” He looked down with a foreboding glare at two young boys, who seemed to be caught between joy and terror at hearing their favorite grisly story. “He journeyed back down the river as winter was ending, back to the village of his ancestors. He fell first upon a woman who was outside repairing her house. All the people found of her was a trail of blood leading off over the ice. Hunters went out searching for the beast that had taken her, and they too were lost, one by one.

“Finally one man returned after catching sight of the creature. He had been out with a friend, and had managed to stay hidden behind a ridge of rocks, watching in silent horror as the beast took down his companion. He described a ten-foot-tall creature with bloody fangs and tearing claws, but still he recognized the face of the boastful man that had left their village last year.

“Now there was a great anger among the people, and they asked their most powerful shaman to punish and destroy the evil man. The shaman gathered his helping spirits to harry and trap the monster, weakening him until the strong men of the village could fall upon him with their spears all together. The beast fought harder than the greatest polar bear, snapping and raking at the men with his sharp claws. Many were struck down before the young hero Tukina pierced the roof of the creature’s mouth, felling him to the ground. When they cut into his belly, they said they could hear the voices of every person he had eaten.”

Mikala could not help but shudder. The people around her stirred as the old man sat down, signaling the end of his tale. Voices mingled lowly along the lodge, as the people began preparing for the night’s sleep. Mikala stepped up to the storyteller. “What is the name of the evil spirit, that the boastful man became?”

The old man peered at her for a moment before answering. “I have heard that he was called an Ocala.”

“I have not heard this word before. Where did this story come from?”

“My grandmother told it to me. She was of the Owl People, who live by the eastern sea. It is a thrilling tale, is it not?”

She nodded, bouncing her son on her hip. “Do you know any other tales of the Ocala?”

The old man smiled, a gap-toothed grin. “I know many horrifying tales, of dark deeds and evil spirits. But you might not sleep well tonight if I told them to you, alone as you are…”

“Other stories of men become beasts, and how to fight them?” she persisted.

He raised a silvery eyebrow at her. “Do you need to know so urgently? You only just got here. And why has a woman like you been traveling alone with a child, and in this season?”

Mikala sighed, and looked around apprehensively. No one seemed to be paying them much attention. “My husband has become a beast,” she said in hushed tone, “and we had to leave.”

The storyteller frowned. “All men beat their women at times,” he chided, “it is sometimes necessary, as well you should know. Go back to him, and bring him back his child.” He looked stern now.

“No, he has changed. I think he has an evil spirit inside him. We are not safe with him. I am seeking the counsel of a wise man, a shaman, who can help me restore the good man inside him once more.” She was speaking very quickly now, looking intently into his eyes. “Do you know how to remove evil spirits? The kind that make men do terrible things? Do you know how to stop a man from being an Ocala?”

The old man sat back, an unreadable expression on his face. “I have many stories, and no small magic. I will think on this thing for you. What is your name?”

“I am called Mikala,” she said. “I have traveled very far, to find this thing.”

“Stay among us and find rest, Mikala,” he said. “I am called Ongat. Tomorrow I will speak with my helping spirits.”

“Thank you, Ongat.” Djalo began to fuss as she stepped away, so she brought him to the sleeping compartment on the women’s side of the lodge, which had been offered on her arrival.

Mikala played idly with her son as they lay together on the fur-lined bench. She sang softly to him. “Now we are again among the People, they will know what to do. Life will be as it ought, and you will run and play with the other boys, little Djalo. Everything is going to get better.”

“Eat,” the little child said.

“Hungry? I know, minnow. There is plenty of food here.” She rose to beg another portion, keeping him close to her as she went.

* * *

Mikala awoke the next morning to her son seeking to nurse. She lay and watched the quiet satisfaction on his face for some time. She was glad to have so much milk for him, after the lean journey they had faced. Then she peered her head around curiously at the small commotion on the other side of the skin hanging, which divided her from the next person down on the sleeping bench. A young woman lay there alone, whom Mikala had been told was a recent widow. She looked very pale, and weak.

“What has happened to her?” Mikala asked the women standing around her.

“Poor thing is too weak to rise this morning,” said one.

“She must have caught some sickness,” said another.

Mikala gave her one last long look, then turned back to dress herself and her son for the day.

The shaman Ongat sought Mikala out later on. “What have you learned?” she asked.

Ongat shook his head. “My helping spirits are being difficult,” he grumbled. “They are unimpressed with me and my shoddy appearance.” He looked down at his worn and threadbare parka. It may have once been fine, but was now quite aged. He looked at Mikala significantly.

Her mouth twisted. The man had no wife; she knew where this was going. “I could sew you new clothes, wise one, but I have no skins, and very little sinew to sew with.”

“It just so happens that my neighbor has given me some fine pelts from his last seal hunt,” the old man said with a grin. “In payment for my latest great work of magic. I wasn’t sure what I would be able to do with them, not having a wife to care for me currently. This is fortunate for both of us. Come, let us see what you can do.”

And so Mikala followed the wise man to his area of the communal lodge, where all the unmarried people lived, to retrieve the skins. Then she went back to sit with the other women and began to cut them for parka and pants. The familiar domestic task brought a smile to her face, as she sat near the lamp and watched her son play with the other children. Why had she ever turned her back on this kind of life? For the moment, she felt a kind of peace she had forgotten could even exist in her heart.

“Ow!” cried a small voice. Mikala jerked her head up from her work, to see her son struggling with another young boy. “He bit me!” the other child cried.

Mikala jumped from her place and descended upon the boys, pulling her son back behind her. “Djalo, what have you done?” she cried, fear in her voice. Her child just grinned. She turned back to the crying boy. “Let me see,” she demanded, holding out her hand. The child tearfully extended his arm, and Mikala pushed back the sleeve. A little reddened half-moon raised up from his flesh, but it was not broken open. She breathed a sigh of relief. “Look, there, you are fine,” she said to the boy, stroking her hand over the mark. His skin was so warm.

“Djalo,” she turned back to her son sternly. “Do not hurt the other children!” He just kept smiling up at her, so she pulled him back and made him sit down closer to her. She resumed her work, though with a much less peaceful mind.

* * *

Each day thereafter, another of the People awoke pale and drawn. Everyone muttered and looked around fearfully, worried now about the strange illness. Mikala kept sewing the old man’s clothes. As the days passed, several more in the lodge were similarly afflicted, and Mikala’s task neared completion. At least the health of the young widow, the first victim, had started to improve.

Mikala presented her completed work to Ongat. “Surely the spirits will find you suitably impressive now,” she said, proud of the garment’s straight lines and neat stitches.

The old man inspected the coat and pants with shrewd eyes and pursed lips, squinting at the tight seams and running his fingers over the alternating bands of light and dark skin she had made into an attractive trim on legs and sleeves. “Passable,” he said. “The spirits might deign to speak with me now. I will call on them tonight.” He moved toward his compartment with the garments folded over his arm. “And if they still don’t want to be helpful,” he called back over his shoulder to her, “you might want to start finding some beads. The parka is nice, but it is awfully plain.”

 

The people watched in hushed silence that evening in the communal longhouse as Ongat danced his way into his trance that would call the spirits into him. Several young men took up a pounding rhythm on large skin drums to help, and sweet-smelling herbs burned in the fires. “Oh, great spirits,” he called out, eyes wild and not focused on anything that Mikala could see, “we People of the Peregrine need your help.” He threw his arms into the air. “There is a strange sickness among us, sapping the strength of our brothers and sisters. None of us have ever seen anything like it. What is the cause of this illness? How can we stop it?”

He threw a handful of dried leaves into the nearest flame, something that burned darker and more cloying in Mikala’s nostrils. She wrinkled her nose, trying to hide her irritation that the old man was not asking what she had paid him to ask. Instead, the pace of his dance was speeding up, and he cocked his head like he was listening to something no one else could hear. He spun and flailed, grunted and cried out, as if speaking with these spirits was a great torment.

Finally, he stilled. “Thank you, oh wise ones,” he bellowed with clearer voice. “Please accept our offering of the sacred smokes. May their aroma sustain, and be pleasing to you.”

The drums wound down as Ongat collapsed into a restive crouch on the floor. The people began to crowd around him, eager for him to recover enough to tell them what the spirits had said.

Mikala hung back, scowling. She supposed the needs of his community should rightly come first, but she felt cheated. She did not walk away, however. She was as curious as the rest about what the spirits would reveal regarding the mysterious illness.

“A creature is taking their blood,” the old man croaked, after an appropriate amount of suspense had been built. “Check their bodies closely, and wounds will be found.”

The people rushed to check on those that had fallen ill. Cries erupted around one, then another of the beds. A puncture wound had been found on each person, somewhere under their clothes.

“It does not look like a bite,” one woman said.

“But the spirits said it was a creature. Maybe its mouth is small and strange.”

“Has anyone seen anything strange crawling around in the lodge?” the head man asked.

The people all shook their heads.

“We will keep watch,” he grunted. “Everyone has fallen ill at night, while we all sleep. Tonight we will keep the fires in the longhouse bright, and take turns watching for it to come.”

The people pressed Ongat for more details, but he had none. He only bid them to lay walrus-tusk carvings around the thresholds, to renew the magic that protected the spaces of the People from the Darkness and the Winds, where all evil spirits come from. Mikala took her son with her to go to sleep early. She refused to meet the old man’s eyes.

* * *

No new victims appeared the next morning, nor had anyone caught sight of anything unusual in the lodge. The people only grew more nervous. Did the creature know that they knew? Was someone talking to it, or was it amongst them now: an invisible, thirsty ghost? They laid the prescribed amulets and hoped it would be enough.

Ongat had proven to be as unscrupulous as Mikala had feared. “Boots, to match the parka,” he had demanded when she confronted him the next day. “The spirits only tell secrets about their own brethren to the most powerful, important-looking men.”

If he was just another charlatan, Mikala might have moved on by now. But his story of the Ocala was too similar to Arawk’s curse. And he had at least tantalized her with one more clue amongst his excuses: “A man becomes an Ocala when he attracts the attention of a particular spirit, and lets it into his heart. My helper spirits are afraid of that one, and do not wish to anger it. I must make them respect me more, to get them talking.”

And so Mikala swallowed her pride and measured the old man for boots, even if it was bound to make for more gossip around the women’s hearth. She stitched as fine and tight as she was able, and lined the lower seams with smoked reindeer skin to make them more waterproof, in the way taught to her by her own mother.

But the meticulous work took a long time. Winter ice froze over the slowest parts of the river. The strange sickness seemed to have passed, and people started talking about moving on, to the next season’s camps and better hunting.

The families began leaving, in pairs or trios, sometimes single sleds. It didn’t take large groups to hunt seal at the edge of the sea ice, so in this season the greater fishing villages dissolved into groups of friends or closer kin to scatter across the coast.

One sledge came back, the very day after the driver and his wife had set out to meet a cousin in the east. “There may be a bear ranging near the village,” he said to those that remained. “I turned back to warn you. We found a family torn apart in their snow house, when we paused by their shelter last night.”

“A bear came into their house?” someone asked, shuddering.

“That doesn’t sound like an ordinary bear,” Ongat said, eyes settling on Mikala as she drew her son into her arms.

The next day two yipping dogs strayed into the camp, blood on the frayed traces still attached to them. They had belonged to a different family than the ones who had been found dismembered and gnawed upon. And they had been heading to the east too.

“You came here from the east. You brought him down on us, didn’t you,” Ongat roared to Mikala, white brows stitched in angry furrows. “The Ocala. The husband from which you flee.”

She did not deny it. “Ask the spirits again, how we can stop him,” Mikala pleaded.

Ongat talked to those that remained in the village instead. The People of the Peregrine decided quickly to drive their guest out of the longhouse, to leave her to the mercy of the Wind and Dark. Had not the strange sickness started after she arrived, too? The woman was bad luck. She must have done something wrong, broken some taboo among her own people that had her outcast and traveling alone in the first place. The Peregrine People would not share in her punishment.

And so Mikala set out on foot in the new snow, baby on her back, cast out from the People once again. She did not argue or defend herself, even as her heart thudded in her chest so hard she thought it might burst loose. She scowled and kept her eyes fixed on the western horizon.

She followed some of the sled tracks for a long while, but never caught up to anyone. She and Djalo were half-frozen when they came to a little stone house built under a great bird-rock. It was the wrong season for birds, but there was one man living inside.

“The spirits told me if I stayed here I would be provided a woman,” he grinned through rotten teeth at her.

Mikala could only smile submissively. It was so warm under his roof. “You talk to spirits?” she asked as she accepted his hospitality and a strip of frozen fish.

The man shook his head. “The great shaman Erdat gave me that message, the last time he was spirit-singing.” He sat very close to her and began stroking her hair. “I am called Udja.”

“I am not looking for a husband, Udja,” Mikala said curtly, sliding further along the edge of the sleeping platform.

“Everyone has left for the winter. You have nowhere else to go,” the man pointed out.

“Maybe I am a ghost, and do not fear the cold.”

Udja waved his hand toward the door. “Then go back to the Wind and Dark, if you don’t want to warm my bed.”

Djalo started fussing, but quieted down when the man cut him another strip of salmon. Then his greasy fingers were winding through Mikala’s hair, brushing against her cheek. “I am being so generous. See, I share what I have, and you share with me. It is the way of things.”

She twitched, then forced her body to relax, turning a broad smile toward the man. His hand dove inside her coat. “Wait until my boy falls asleep, at least. He tends to interrupt.”

“Mama,” Djalo chirped, climbing up her shoulder to shove tiny fingers shining with fish oil into her face. “Look!”

The man squeezed her flesh as he thought on her request, too roughly to be anything but painful. When he released her, he all but shoved her toward the child. “Settle him down quickly, then. I have been lonely for a long time.”

The hut was filthy, though the man seemed to be trying to tidy up as she patted Djalo to sleep. “Rest now, and our troubles will be over soon,” she whispered to the babe. Mikala was surprised that her rage did not make her fingers quiver. The boy’s little eyes closed, his breathing going slow and even. “This one deserves worse than needle and hollow bone.” She could confess while he slept, when her son could not understand. She wanted him never to understand, what she was doing for him. “I will make my milk rich for you, minnow, on more than just stolen blood this time. This ugly man’s fat and flesh will sustain us for the winter, while we hide from your father. And then we will look again for our cure.”

When the man tried to press Mikala into the bed a short time later, her jaws stretched and closed over his throat before he could even scream. Djalo slept on, undisturbed as his mother slaked her hunger and then butchered the rest into portions that would keep them strong until they could resume their quest. Until they were ready to once more try to be People.

 

* * * * *

 

Mikala found it difficult to settle into sleep next to Ubbe, her memories and fears continuing to spiral. In the daytime, it was easier not to think of these things. Of being a monster. In the long hours of night, when everyone was at rest, then the curse would start whispering in her ear.

The hut was filled with the soft sounds of breathing, gentle snores and steady heartbeats. The scent of People, so often a comfort, was only a torment for Mikala now. She regretted what she had done to ready herself for Arawk’s arrival in Kattegat, although Dag’s organs had rejuvenated her strength. She could have fought off Arawk if she had to. If Ubbe had not proved to be so skilled.

She found she regretted it every time she decided she needed to embrace the curse just once more. Now the cravings were back. And every time this happened, they seemed stronger.

She rose in the dark, leaving Djalo in Ubbe’s arms. Try as she might, Mikala could not detect any change in the man’s affection for the boy. People had turned on them before, and most would not hesitate to kill a child revealed to be a monster. But in the moon that she had known him, Ubbe had always been incapable of hiding his real feelings. She could trust his intentions. The one she could not trust was herself.

She had thought about the sharp needle, the numbing unguent, the hollow bone and the taste of sweet blood on her lips. Their hosts might never notice. But she did not want to go back to those sad half-measures. She was stronger than that. She could resist. It got better eventually, if she resisted. She almost felt human again at those times, as she did when she first entered Ubbe’s house.

The blast of cold air as she crept out of the hut tingled all of her senses. She knew the evil spirit was strong inside her, because the wind did not hurt, and the darkness seemed to sing. She belonged out here.

Mikala closed the door softly. All the homes in the village were shut up tight. The wind whistled and seemed to sweep right through her, unresisted. Sharp crystals of icy snow glistened in the moonlight and drifted higher against wooden walls. Her own body felt just as thin, ready to drift with the winds just the same. She looked down, realized she had left her parka inside. And that it did not matter. She could pretend sometimes, but truly she was a monster.

Exhaustion swept through her next, but she couldn’t lay beside Ubbe like this. The ice was better than the temptation of warm breath and hot blood inside that hut. Mikala staggered to a deep snowbank at the edge of the village and plunged inside, welcoming the freeze that made her blood cool and flow easier both at once.

 

Mikala slept, until the crunch of feet resonated through the snow above her head. She felt as if in a dream, watching herself stir. The thick, humid scent of a living body hit her nose when her head broke above the crust that had formed over her in the night.

The sun had not yet risen above the edge of the earth. Only the light of the stars showed the shocked face of the man whose footsteps had woken her. He was no one she recognized. Mikala felt her limbs coil to spring, and by the time it occurred to her to stop their movement, the stranger’s blood was already staining the snow.

It had been too early for anyone else to be about. No one had witnessed what Mikala had done. She woke Ubbe with warm hands and snowy hair. “We must leave. Now.”

His eyes snapped open. “Is it Arawk? Has he found us already?”

“There is a body, at the edge of the village. They will think an animal did it. But I fear differently. We must hasten our pace.”

“You still haven’t told me where we are going.”

“To where your mother said. To face the dead.”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's been a long hiatus, sorry everyone! Hope there are still some readers... let me know what you thought about how this went. The Real Story is on, now!


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